Now, it is interesting to see the formidable way in which M. Bourget went
at that poor, humble little thing. He moved upon it in column--three
columns--and with artillery.

"Two reasons of a very different kind explain"--that fact.

And now that I have got so far, I am almost afraid to say what his two
reasons are, lest I be charged with inventing them. But I will not
retreat now; I will condense them and print them, giving my word that I
am honest and not trying to deceive any one.

1. Young married women are protected from the approaches of the seducer
in New England and vicinity by the diluted remains of a prudence created
by a Puritan law of two hundred years ago, which for a while punished
adultery with death.

2. And young married women of the other forty or fifty States are
protected by laws which afford extraordinary facilities for divorce.

If I have not lost my mind I have accurately conveyed those two Vesuvian
irruptions of philosophy. But the reader can consult Chapter IV. of
'Outre-Mer', and decide for himself. Let us examine this paralyzing
Deduction or Explanation by the light of a few sane facts.

1. This universality of "protection" has existed in our country from the
beginning; before the death penalty existed in New England, and during
all the generations that have dragged by since it was annulled.

2. Extraordinary facilities for divorce are of such recent creation that