m of their husbands' talents or reputation in
the world, it is as if you made mention of some office that they held.
It can hardly be otherwise, when the instant any subject is started or
conversation arises, in which men are interested, or try one another's
strength, the women leave the room, or attend to something else. The
qualities, then, in which men are ambitious to excel, and which ensure
the applause of the world,--eloquence, genius, learning, integrity,--are
not those which gain the favour of the fair. I must not deny, however,
that wit and courage have this effect. Neither is youth or beauty the
sole passport to their affections.

The way of woman's will is hard to find,
Harder to hit.

Yet there is some clue to this mystery, some determining cause; for we
find that the same men are universal favourites with women, as others
are uniformly disliked by them. Is not the loadstone that attracts so
powerfully, and in all circumstances, a strong and undisguised bias
towards them, a marked attention, a conscious preference of them to
every other passing object or topic? I am not sure, but I incline
to think so. The successful lover is the _cavalier servente_ of all
nations. The man of gallantry behaves as if he had made an assignation
with every woman he addresses. An argument immediately draws off my
attention from the prettiest woman in the room. I accordingly succeed
better in argument--than in love!--I do not think that what is called
_Love at first sight_ is so great an absurdity as it is sometimes
imagined to be. We generally make up our minds beforehand to the sort of
person we should like,--grave or gay, black, brown, or fair; with golden
tresses or with raven locks;--and when we meet with a complete example
of the qualities we admire, the bargain is soon struck. We have never
seen anything to come up to our newly-discovered goddess before, but she
is what we have been all our lives looking for. The idol we fall down
and worship is an image familiar to our minds. It has been present to
our waking thoughts, it has haunted us in our dreams, like some fairy
vision. Oh! thou who, the first time I over beheld thee, didst draw my
soul into the circle of thy heavenly looks, and wave enchantment
round me, do not think thy conquest less complete because it was
instantaneous; for in that gentle form (as if another Imogen had
entered) I saw all that I had ever loved of female grace, modesty, and
sweetness!

I shal