So far as the only decent theory of the relations of the sexes was
involuntarily explicit, by virtue of certain explosions on the subject,
it was something like this: That, at a certain age, say twenty-one, or,
for leniency, twenty, as it were on the striking of a clock, the young
girl, who previously had been profoundly and inexpressibly unconscious
that the male being existed, would suddenly sit up wide awake in an
attitude of attention to offers of marriage; and that, similarly, the
young man, who had meanwhile lived with his eyes shut and his senses
asleep, would jump up also at the striking of a clock, and, as it were,
with hilarity, say, "It is high time I chose a wife," and thereupon
begin to look about, among the streets and tennis-parties known to him,
for that impossible paragon,--a wife to satisfy both his parents.

One or two of Henry's earliest troubles and most drastic punishments had
come of a propensity to "sweethearts," developed at an indecorously
early age, and in fact at the time of which I write he could barely
recall the name of Miss This or Miss The Other by the association of
ancient physical pangs suffered for their sake. The greatest danger to
such contraband passions was undoubtedly the post; for, in the Mesurier
household, a more than Russian censorship was exercised over the
incoming and--as far as it could be controlled--the outgoing mail. One
old morning, at family breakfast, which the subsequent events of the
evening were to fix on his mind, Henry Mesurier had grown white with
fear, as the stupid maid had handed him a fat letter addressed in a
sprawling school-girl's hand.

"Who is your letter from, Henry?" asked the father.

Henry blushed and boggled.