r that the journey to Rome was to be made
when their means would admit. 'I will go to Rome,' said Flaxman, 'and
show the President that wedlock is for man's good rather than for his
harm, and you, Ann, shall accompany me.' He kept his word."

By forbidding our young men and maidens matrimony, we blast humanity in
its very dawn. Fathers, you say you teach your sons prudence--you do
nothing of the kind; your worldly-wise and clever son is already ruined
for life. You will find him at Cremorne and at the Argyle Rooms. Your
wretched worldly-wisdom taught him to avoid the snare of marrying young;
and soon, if he is not involved in embarrassments which will last him a
life, he is a _blase_ fellow; heartless, false; without a single generous
sentiment or manly aim; he has--

"No God, no heaven, in the wide world."

CHAPTER XIII.
BREACH OF PROMISE CASES.

Every now and then, while the courts sit at Westminster, the general
public derives an immense amount of entertainment from what are described
as breach of promise cases. It is true there is a wonderful sameness
about them. The defendant is amorous, and quotes a great deal of poetry.
The court vastly enjoys the perusal of his letters, and the papers quote
them entire and unabridged. The lady suffers much, and the public
sympathies are decidedly with her. Of course there are some atrocious
cases, for which the men who figure in them cannot be punished too
severely; but as a rule, we do think the men have the worst of it. A
young man is thrown into the company of an attractive young female; they
both have little to do at the time, and naturally fall in love. She has
as much to do with the matter as he, and yet, if he begins to think that
he cannot keep a wife--that the marriage will not promote the happiness
of the parties concerned--that the affair was rash, and had better be
broken off--he is liable to an action for breach of promise. Such cases
are constantly occurring. The jury being decidedly romantic--thinking
love in a cottage to be Elysium--forgetting the vulgar saying that when
poverty comes in at the door love flys out of the window--mark their
sense of the enormity of the defendant's conduct in refusing to make an
imprudent marriage, by awarding to the lady substantial damages.

Now, we can understand how English jurymen--generally men with
marriageable daughters, can easily make up their minds to give damages in
such cases, but we more t