“Why, mother, can you live without your Ninie?”
“Yes, my darling, because I shall be living for you. Will not my motherly heart be constantly rejoiced by the idea that I am contributing, as I ought, to your fortune and your husband’s?”
“But, my dear, adorable mother, am I to be alone there with Paul? At once?—Quite alone?—What will become of me? What will happen? What ought I to do—or not to do?”
“Poor child, do you think I mean to desert you forthwith at the first battle? We will write to each other three times a week, like two lovers, and thus we shall always live in each other’s heart. Nothing can happen to you that I shall not know, and I will protect you against all evil.—And besides, it would be too ridiculous that I should not go to visit you; that would cast a reflection on your husband; I shall always spend a month or two with you in Paris—”
“Alone—alone with him, and at once!” cried Natalie in terror, interrupting her mother.
“Are you not to be his wife?”
“Yes, and I am quite content; but tell me at least how to behave.—You, who did what you would with my father, know all about it, and I will obey you blindly.”
Madame Evangelista kissed her daughter’s forehead; she had been hoping and waiting for this request.
“My child, my advice must be adapted to the circumstances. Men are not all alike. The lion and the frog are less dissimilar than one man as compared with another, morally speaking. Do I know what will happen to you tomorrow? I can only give you general instructions as to your general plan of conduct.”
“Dearest mother, tell me at once all you know.”
“In the first place, my dear child, the cause of ruin to married women who would gladly retain their husband’s heart—and,” she added, as a parenthesis, “to retain their affection and to rule the man are one and the same thing—well, the chief cause of matrimonial differences lies in the unbroken companionship, which did not subsist in former days, and which was introduced into this country with the mania for family life. Ever since the Revolution vulgar notions have invaded aristocratic households. This misfortune is attributable to one of their writers, Rousseau, a base heretic, who had none but reactionary ideas, and who—how I know not—argued out the most irrational conclusions. He asserted that all women have the same rights and the same faculties; that under the conditions of social life the laws of Nature must be obeyed—as if the wife of a Spanish Grandee—as if you or I—had anything in common with a woman of the people. And since then women of rank have nursed their own children, have brought up their daughters, and lived at home.
“Life has thus been made so complicated that happiness is almost impossible; for such an agreement of two characters as has enabled you and me to live together as friends is a rare exception. And perpetual friction is not less to be avoided between parents and children than between husband and wife. There are few natures in which love can survive in spite of omnipresence; that miracle is the prerogative of God.
“So, place the barriers of society between you and Paul; go to balls, to the opera, drive out in the morning, dine out in the evening, pay visits; do not give Paul more than a few minutes of your time. By this system you will never lose your value in his eyes. When two beings have nothing but sentiment to go through life on, they soon exhaust its resources, and ere long satiety and disgust ensue. Then, when once the sentiment is blighted, what is to be done? Make no mistake; when love is extinct, only indifference or contempt ever fills its place. So be always fresh and new to him. If he bores you—that may occur—at any rate, never bore him. To submit to boredom on occasion is one of the conditions of every form of power. You will have no occasion to vary your happiness either by thrift in money matters or the management of a household; hence, if you do not lead your husband to share your outside pleasures, if you do not amuse him, in short, you will sink into the most crushing lethargy. Then begins the spleen of love. But we always love those who amuse us or make us happy. To give and to receive happiness are two systems of wifely conduct between which a gulf lies.”
“Dear mother, I am listening, but I do not understand.”
“If you love Paul so blindly as to do everything he desires, and if he makes you really happy, there is an end of it; you will never be the mistress, and the wisest precepts in the world will be of no use.”
“That is rather clearer; but I learn the rule without knowing how to apply it,” said Natalie, laughing. “Well, I have the theory, and practice will follow.”
“My poor Ninie,” said her mother, dropping a sincere tear as she thought of her daughter’s marriage and pressed her to her heart, “events will strengthen your memory.—In short, my Natalie,” said she after a pause, during which they sat clasped in a sympathetic embrace, “you will learn that each of us, as a woman, has her destiny, just as every man has his vocation. A woman is born to be a woman of fashion, the charming mistress of her house, just as a man is born to be a General or a poet. Your calling in life is to attract. And your education has fitted you for the world. In these days a woman ought to be brought up to grace a drawing-room, as of old she was brought up for the Gynecaeum. You, child, were never made to be the mother of a family or a notable housekeeper.
“If you have children, I hope they will not come to spoil your figure as soon
