e silence of our
Hermione than Hermione descends from her pedestal and falls a-talking
like other people. Woman, in a word, protests; and protests are often
very dangerous things to the protesters. Nothing, for instance, can seem
more simple or more effective than the _tu quoque_ retort, and as it is
familiar to feminine disputants, we are favored with it in every
possible form. If the girl of the period is fast and frivolous, is the
young man of the period any better? No sketch can be more telling than
the picture which she is ready to draw of his lounging ways, his
epicurean indolence, his boredom at home, his foppery abroad, the
vacancy of his stare, the inanity of his talk, his incredible conceit,
his life vibrating between the Club and the stable. She hits off with a
charming vivacity the list of his accomplishments--his skill at
flirtation, his matchless ability at croquet, his assiduity over _Bell's
Life_, the cleverness of his book on the Derby. No sensible or
well-informed girl, she tells us, can talk for ten minutes to this
creature without weariness and disgust at his ignorance, his narrowness,
his triviality; no modestly-dressed or decently-mannered girl can win
the slightest share of his attentions. Married, he is as frivolous as
before marriage; he selects the toilette of the _demi-monde_ as an
agreeable topic of domestic conversation, he resents affection and
proclaims home a bore, he grudges the birth of children as an additional
expense, he stunts and degrades the education of his girls, he is the
despot of his household and the dread of his family.

The sketch is powerful enough in its way, but the conclusion which the
fair artist draws is at least an odd one. We prepare ourselves to hear
that woman has resolved to extirpate such a monster as this, or that she
will remain an obstinate vestal till a nobler breed of wooers arises.
What woman owns that she really does is to mould herself as much on the
monster's model as she can. According to her own account, she puts
nature's picture of herself into the hands of this imbecile, invites him
to blur it as he will, and lets him write under the daub "_Ego feci._"
As he cannot talk sense, she stoops to bandy chaff and slang. As he
refuses to be attracted by modesty of dress and manner, she apes the
dress and manner of the _demi-monde_. His indolence, his triviality, his
worldliness become her own. As he finds home a bore, she too plunges
into her round of diss