Rational courtship, and prudent views of widowed lovers: A strange doubt hinted: The husband's code: Laws are quickly prescribed, and Yes is easily said

I have already mentioned my aunt, her imprudent first marriage, the rector's resentment, who used to pronounce himself the most unfortunate of men, in undutiful children, and her irksome dependence on his bounty. With this aunt Mr. Elford, a man of much worth, considerable knowledge, and great integrity of intention, became acquainted, and by a variety of motives was prompted to pay her his addresses.

No people are so certain of the happiness of a state of wedlock as a couple courting. Some difference however must be made, between lovers who have never married, and lovers who, having made the experiment, find it possible that a drop of gall may now and then embitter the cup of honey. My aunt's first husband had been a man of an easy disposition, and readily swayed to good or ill. She had seldom suffered contradiction from him, or heard reproach. A kind of good humoured indolence had accustomed him rather to ward off accusation with banter, or to be silent under it, than to contend. His extravagance had obliged her to study the strictest economy; she, therefore, was the ostensible person; she regulated, she corrected, she complained. She had a tincture of the rector in her composition, and her husband's follies afforded sufficient opportunities for the exercise of her office.

After his death, which happened early, the wrecks of his originally small fortune, scarcely afforded her subsistence for a year. By many humble but grating concessions on her part, and no less proud upbraidings on the part of her father, she was first allowed a trifling annuity, almost too scanty to afford the means of life, and, as it were in resentment to the unpardonable conduct of my mother, was afterward permitted to return to the parsonage house.

The state of subjection in which she was kept, the dissatisfaction this evidently created, the gloom that was visible in her countenance, and that seemed to oppress her heart, added to a disconsolate and habitual taciturnity, soon occasioned Mr. Elford to consider her with compassion: and the very question—can I not afford her relief? gave birth to ideas of a still more tender nature.

These were seconded by a retrospect to his own situation. He had lost a beloved wife, who had left him an infant daughter, in whose future felicity he was strongly interested. He had often considered the subject of education, and had become the determined enemy of boarding-schools, where every thing is taught and nothing understood; where airs, graces, mouth primming, shoulder-setting and elbow-holding are studied, and affectation, formality, hypocrisy, and pride are acquired; and where children the most promising are presently transformed into vain, pert misses, who imagine that to perk up their heads, turn out their toes, and exhibit the ostentatious opulence of their relations, in a tawdry ball night dress, is the summit of perfection.

Determined that his child should be sent to no such academy, he considered a second marriage as necessary. Though an excellent economist, he was utterly a stranger to avarice. My aunt was neither rich, nor handsome, nor young; being, according to the rector's account, on the debtor side of his books, of an adust complection, atrabilarious in look and temper, thirty-four, and two years older than Mr. Elford. But he imagined he could make her happy; or at least could relieve her from a state little less than miserable. He likewise supposed that she was well fitted to promote plans which he held to be wise. Errors in moral calculations frequently escape undetected, even by the most accurate.

But, as he was very sincere and honest in his intentions, he thought proper, while paying his court to her, to explain what his expectations were, and the reasons on which they were grounded. His system was, there must be government; and, if government, there must be governors. This by the by I believe to be a radical mistake in politics; though I likewise believe there is not one man in fifty thousand who would not scoff at me for the supposition. Proceeding in his hypothesis, he concluded that the strongest understanding had a prescriptive and inherent right to govern; and with great candour, thus laying down the law to my aunt, he undisguisedly avowed a conviction that his understanding was the strongest, and that to govern would be his inherent right.

His words were so powerful, his arguments so excellent, his statement of them so clear, and all his deductions so indubitable, that my aunt had not the least objection to offer. 'That must be allowed—that cannot be denied—nothing can be more reasonable'—were her continual answers. The consequence of all this was a marriage: and my aunt having been noted for her prudence, during the life of her first husband, (though not indeed in having made him her husband) and Mr. Elford's character, for propriety, rectitude and good intention, being still more permanently established, there was not the least doubt entertained, especially by the parties, but that this would be a happy match.

Having thus brought the reader and Mr. Elford together, I must now proceed to relate the manner in which I myself and my good uncle first became acquainted.