Page:Maud Howe - Atlanta in the South.djvu/311

 "I may have done the young man an injustice," said the General, endeavoring to mollify his friend. "Admitting that his regard is as pure as you claim it to be, the great differences of education, of character, of tastes, of race, and of religion, are they not incompatible with a happy marriage?"

"No, sir; I don't care a button for those bugbears. Love is too strong for any and all of them combined; he can knock 'em out in the first round. It would be a good thing if there were more marriages of this sort, General. You New England folks go on marrying and intermarrying with each till your asylums are full of insane people from the eternal consanguinity of your alliances. Your natures grow colder and more intellectual in each generation; while here in the South we are still too much under the sway of our emotions, and a little of the chilly intellectuality of the Northern race would be a good leaven. If I were President of these United States I should legislate to the end of amalgamating the too-cold Northern and the over-hot Southern blood. In two generations we should have the finest race of people, sir, that has existed in this world since the day when Adam broke his alliance with the brutes and called himself man, and their master."

The Colonel had warmed up to his theme,