is dismal and brutal enough to disgust people out of
matrimony.

Fancy bringing a sweet, innocent girl, maybe still in her teens, to
hear a dull, awful, solemn clergyman say to her, in front of her, close
to her: 'Dearly beloved brethren, we are gathered together here, in the
face of this congregation, to join together this man and this woman in
holy matrimony, which is an honourable estate ... not by any to be
enterprised, nor taken in hand unadvisedly, lightly, or wantonly, to
satisfy men's carnal lusts and appetites, like brute beasts that have
no understanding.' And then he goes on to tell you things sufficient to
make your hair stand on end. He tells you that matrimony was ordained
for a remedy against sin. Yes, you bring your darling young bride to
hear herself called a remedy against sin, almost a penance for your
sins. There, behind you, stand half a dozen young bridesmaids,
blushing, wondering what those brute beasts, that have no
understanding, have to do with you, and you feel ready to fall on your
knees and implore the forgiveness of the beloved young bride at your
side for having brought her there to hear such things. When, finally,
that minister says to her, 'Wilt thou have this man to be thy wedded
husband? Wilt thou obey him and serve him, love, honour him?' I wonder
she does not exclaim indignantly: 'Not I, indeed, thanks--not for the
world!'

I do hope the Church will invent a ceremony that will make a wedding,
instead of a fearful ordeal, a thing of beauty never to be forgotten by
those who go through it; the Church made a bower of flowers, sweet
music, a short address consisting of the most beautiful and pathetic
verses from the Proverbs and the Song of Solomon, and a shower of
flowers thrown on the path of the bride, when the ceremony is over.

If I had my own way, I would read to them two or three chapters from
the second part of that inimitable book which has filled so many French
married lives with poetry, 'Monsieur, Madame et Bebe'--only in French;
that book cannot possibly be translated into English.

CHAPTER XLII

ON NURSES

Nurses look the happiest women in the world--Their lives and their
privileges--True story of a nurse.

If I were a woman of robust health, rich or poor, and I had no
fascination for men, and matrimony had no fascination for me, I would
become a nurse. The great, the only problem to solve in life, after
all, is happiness, and the only possible way