I
never regarded marriage as either impossible or possible. It seemed
to me that one was either caught away in a fiery chariot, or else
was left under one's juniper tree; and I have been very comfortable
there. I thought I had all I wanted; and I feel a little dizzy now
at the way in which my cup of life has suddenly been seized and
filled with wine to the brim. One doesn't find a home and a mother
and a wife in a fortnight!"
"I don't know!" said Mrs. Graves, smiling at him. "Some of the best
marriages I know have been made in haste. I remember talking to a
girl the other day who was engaged to a man within ten days of the
time they had met. I said, 'Well, you have not wasted time.' 'Oh,'
she said, apparently rather hurt, 'I kept Henry waiting a long
time. I had to think it all over. I wasn't by any means sure I
wanted to marry him.' I quoted a saying of an old friend of mine
who when he was asked why he had proposed to a girl he had only
known three days, said, 'I don't know! I liked her, and thought I
should like to see more of her!'"
"I think I must make out a list of possible candidates," said
Howard, smiling. "I dare say your Jane would help me. I could mark
them for various qualities; we believe in marks at Cambridge. But I
must have time to get used to all my new gifts."
"Oh, one doesn't take long to get used to happiness," said Mrs.
Graves. "It always seems the most natural thing in the world.
Tennyson was all wrong about sorrow.
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