how he could wish to do the one or
succeed in doing the other. Did he expect such a girl as that would be
happy if he did n't love her? and did he think himself capable of being
happy if it should turn out that she was miserable? If she should n't
be miserable,--that is, if she should be indifferent, and, as they say,
console herself, would he like that any better?

I asked myself all these questions and I should have liked to ask them
of Mr. Tester; but I did n't, for after all he could n't have answered
them. Poor young man! he did n't pry into things as I do; he was not
analytic, like us Americans, as they say in reviews. He thought he was
behaving remarkably well, and so he was--for a man; that was the strange
part of it. It had been proper that in spite of his reluctance he should
take a wife, and he had dutifully set about it. As a good thing is
better for being well done, he had taken the best one he could possibly
find. He was enchanted with--with his young lady, you might ask? Not
in the least; with himself; that is the sort of person a man is! Their
virtues are more dangerous than their vices, and Heaven preserve you
when they want to keep a promise! It is never a promise to _you_, you
will notice. A man will sacrifice a woman to live as a gentleman should,
and then ask for your sympathy--for _him_! And I don't speak of the bad
ones, but of the good. They, after all, are the worst Ambrose Tester, as
I say, did n't go into these details, but synthetic as he might be, was
conscious that his position was false. He felt that sooner or later, and
rather sooner than later, he would have to make it true,--a process that
could n't possibly be agreeable. He would really have to make up his
mind to care for his wife or not to care for her. What would Lady
Vandeleur say to one alternative, and what would little Joscelind say to
the other? That is what it was to have a pertinacious father and to
be an accommodating son. With me, it was easy for Ambrose Tester to be
superficial, for, as I tell you, if I did n't wish to engage him, I did
n't wish to disengage him, and I did n't insist Lady Vandeleur insisted,
I was afraid; to be with her was of course very complicated; even more
than Miss Bernardstone she must have made him feel that his position was
false. I must add that he once mentioned to me that she had told him
he ought to marry. At any rate, it is an immense thing to be a pleasant
fellow. Our young fellow was so uni