experience would uphold and enlighten the home of this young pair?
Paul and his wife would doubtless think they loved when they had
really not advanced beyond the endearments and compliments of the
honeymoon. Would Paul in that early period yield to the tyranny of his
wife, instead of establishing his empire? Could Paul say, "No?" All
was peril to a man so weak where even a strong man ran some risks.

The subject of this Study is not the transition of a bachelor into a
married man,--a picture which, if broadly composed, would not lack the
attraction which the inner struggles of our nature and feelings give
to the commonest situations in life. The events and the ideas which
led to the marriage of Paul with Natalie Evangelista are an
introduction to our real subject, which is to sketch the great comedy
that precedes, in France, all conjugal pairing. This Scene, until now
singularly neglected by our dramatic authors, although it offers novel
resources to their wit, controlled Paul's future life and was now
awaited by Madame Evangelista with feelings of terror. We mean the
discussion which takes place on the subject of the marriage contract
in all families, whether noble or bourgeois, for human passions are as
keenly excited by small interests as by large ones. These comedies,
played before a notary, all resemble, more or less, the one we shall
now relate, the interest of which will be far less in the pages of
this book than in the memories of married persons.



CHAPTER III

THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT--FIRST DAY