Reflections of a Bachelor Girl Part 9

YOU would fancy a girl were a species of ostrich from the amount of flattery a man feeds her before marriage and the two-edged cynicisms he expects her to swallow afterward.

THE average woman goes from the altar into total eclipse from which she never emerges until she becomes a widow--since husbands never look at their wives and other men don't dare.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

THE man who is most in love is most apt to get over it, just as the man who drinks most champagne has the worst headache next morning.

ALL this talk about trial marriages seems so superfluous--considering that marriage has always been a trial.

A MAN'S sense of honor is so peculiar that it gets out of working condition the minute he comes near a pretty woman.

MAN--as far as his opinions and emotions go--is the n.o.blest work of woman.

A KISS and its thrills are soon parted--after the honeymoon.

EVERY woman is born an actress; and actresses are twice as attractive to men as other women because they are twice women.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

A DARK brown "past" is sometimes a good insurance against a black future; the man who has "seen life" is not quite so likely to be looking for it.

HAPPINESS in marriage doesn't depend half so much on whether or not a man keeps the Ten Commandments and goes to church as on whether or not he keeps a pretty stenographer and comes home to dinner.

WHEN a man declares that he knows his own mind, his wife may sometimes wonder why he seems so proud of the acquaintance.

MARRYING a widower is like inheriting an heirloom; marrying a gra.s.s widower is like getting second-hand goods that somebody else has been anxious to get rid of.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

MATRIMONY is a life job with long hours, small pay, hard work, no holidays and no chance to "give notice" if you get tired of it.

AFTER all, a wife has her uses--even if its only as a protection against other ladies' breach of promise suits.

A PRETTY wife in a soiled kimono affects a man like a pate de fois gras served on an old tin plate; it takes away his appet.i.te--for love.

IT always surprises a woman when the son who has been tied to her ap.r.o.n strings suddenly gets tangled up in some chorus girl's shoe strings.

A MAN'S idea of a perfectly loyal, devoted woman is one who will deceive another man for his sake.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

A GIRL'S idea of business is a place where she can meet some man who will take her out of it.

IN THE "relation of the s.e.xes" a man is so likely to regard his wife as the "poor relation."

NO MAN refuses to give a good wife all the credit she deserves; but some of them are rather shy about giving her cash to the same amount.

A WOMAN on her summer vacation soon discovers that a husband is not "a man of letters," but a man of off-hand notes and telegrams.

A LOVER looks at women through rose-colored spectacles, an old bachelor through blue gla.s.ses, and a married man--through a microscope.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

A MAN always feels deeply injured when his wife refuses to believe the story that he has worked at all the way up in the cab to make sound interesting and perfectly plausible.

IT inspires a man with real awe and admiration, after he has spent all day Sunday and broken half the family tools fussing over a fractious lock, to see his wife come along and pick it with one hand and a hairpin.

WHENEVER a man makes up his mind to give up anything, from a woman to a vice, it suddenly becomes so attractive to him that he begins to take a new and violent interest in it.

THE hard part of separating from a husband or wife for summer vacation is trying to look sorry about it when you say good-by at the station.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

TRAIN up a son in the way he should go--and then watch him go some other woman's way.

MAKING hay while the sun s.h.i.+nes is very tame sport beside making love while the moon s.h.i.+nes.

THE dollar sign is the only sign in which the modern man appears to have any real faith.

IT IS a mistake to propose to a girl with whom you have been mooning all morning on the beach until you discover whether that pang you feel is really heart hunger or only the other kind of hunger; the two have such similar effects.

YOU can lead a husband to the restaurant, but you can't make him order champagne--unless it's another woman's husband.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

LOVE seldom follows marriage, unless marriage follows love.

WHEN a man says that "circ.u.mstances" have forced him to break his engagement with you, it is pretty safe to conclude that "Circ.u.mstances"

wears smarter frocks or has a more fascinating way of doing her hair.

SOME bright day women will learn that it is as impossible to revive a man's interest in a girl whom he has ceased to love as to make him want stale champagne with all the fizz gone out of it.

ALL the great tragedies are written about the woman who isn't married to some man, but ought to be; when as a matter of fact the most tragic figure on earth is the woman who is married to him and oughtn't to be.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

THERE are two kinds of masculine hearts; the kind like a peach, soft and impressionable on the outside, but stony at the core; and the kind like a nut, seemingly impenetrable, but sweet and satisfying once you get through the sh.e.l.l.

A MAN doesn't object to a girl who smokes cigarettes, wears three-ply collars and calls him "old chap" because he considers her immoral, but because he considers her just a bad imitation of himself.

A WOMAN can do nothing wrong, as long as a man is in love with her, and nothing right after he ceases to be.

THE only way to be happy with a man is to have such blind faith that you can believe him when he vows he never kissed another woman, even though the scent of the last girl's sachet still clings to his coat lapel.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

MARRYING a woman, after you have kept her ten years waiting, is like buying a doll that has stood too long in the showcase.

WHEN a man asks a girl for a kiss, she _has_ to refuse him, but when he simply takes it, she has to take it, too.