What?--if any young ladies read this page, I have only to inform them
that when the same mishap befalls them, which now had for more than
twelve hours befallen Harry Foker, people will grow interesting to
them for whom they did not care sixpence on the day before; as on the
other hand persons of whom they fancied themselves fond will be found
to have become insipid and disagreeable. Then your dearest Eliza or
Maria of the other day, to whom you wrote letters and sent locks of
hair yards long, will on a sudden be as indifferent to you as your
stupidest relation: while, on the contrary, about _his_ relations you
will begin to feel such a warm interest! such a loving desire to
ingratiate yourself with _his_ mamma; such a liking for that dear kind
old man _his_ father! If He is in the habit of visiting at any house,
what advances you will make in order to visit there too. If He has a
married sister you will like to spend long mornings with her. You will
fatigue your servant by sending notes to her, for which there will be
the most pressing occasion, twice or thrice in a day. You will cry if
your mamma objects to your going too often to see His family. The only
one of them you will dislike, is perhaps his younger brother, who is
at home for the holidays, and who will persist in staying in the room
when you come to see your dear new-found friend, his darling second
sister. Something like this will happen to you, young ladies, or, at
any rate, let us hope it may. Yes, you must go through the hot fits
and the cold fits of that pretty fever. Your mothers, if they would
acknowledge it, have passed through it before you were born, your dear
papa being the object of the passion of course--who could it be but
he? And as you suffer it so will your brothers in their way--and after
their kind. More selfish than you: more eager and headstrong than you:
they will rush on their destiny when the doomed charmer makes her
appearance. Or if they don't, and you don't, Heaven help you! As the
gambler said of his dice, to love and win is the best thing, to love