He is rich, and can afford a good article. She must be young and
handsome, fit to grace the fine house he will take for her in
fashionable Bloomsbury, far from the odour and touch of oil and
tallow. She must be well bred, with a gracious, noble manner, that
will charm his guests and reflect honour and credit upon himself; she
must, above all, be of good family, with a genealogical tree
sufficiently umbrageous to hide Lavender Wharf from the eyes of
Society.

What else she may or may not be he does not very much care. She
will, of course, be virtuous and moderately pious, as it is fit and
proper that women should be. It will also be well that her
disposition be gentle and yielding, but that is of minor importance,
at all events so far as he is concerned: the Ingerfield husbands are
not the class of men upon whom wives vent their tempers.

Having decided in his mind WHAT she shall be, he proceeds to discuss
with himself WHO she shall be. His social circle is small.
Methodically, in thought, he makes the entire round of it, mentally
scrutinising every maiden that he knows. Some are charming, some are
fair, some are rich; but no one of them approaches near to his
carefully considered ideal.

He keeps the subject in his mind, and muses on it in the intervals of
business. At odd moments he jots down names as they occur to him
upon a slip of paper, which he pins for the purpose on the inside of
the cover of his desk. He arranges them alphabetically, and when it
is as complete as his memory can make it, he goes critically down the
list, making a few notes against each. As a result, it becomes clear
to him that he must seek among strangers for his wife.