I was a youth blue-eyed and fair of face, tall, thin and having a
complying spirit that has been--But let me not anticipate. The race
after fashion ever wearied me--I shall stop early at some
standing-collar or heavy-neckcloth period--and I never cared much for
money--could live with it or without it, desiring "this man's art or
that man's scope" rather than his cash. There is such a great majority
of poor folks, I expected to be one of them; still, I had a taste for
honesty, asked favors of nobody, considered the least debt a
degradation, and thought myself better than most rich people. I was of
the family and the religion of Plato, who peddled oil to pay his
expenses while travelling in Egypt.
We discover in others what they most wish to hide: therefore I early
discovered that Lydia's mother, who had a large girl-family, and who
knew that the supply of some one to love greatly exceeds the demand,
was anxious to secure me as a son-in-law. I was glad of it, for, let
poets and novelists say what they will, the young fellow who marries
with the approval of friends drifts happily on, while the rash boy who
weds against the good sense of his elders is dragged bleeding along a
rough way.
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