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208 we all know to what feeling pity is akin! Here, then, are three creatures—forgive me, Flora—one creature, Peg Dobbs: a mere man, that is myself: and a bright angel, I need not say who that is—all wretched. At this moment, Sir Cresswell glides down, to his Court in his brougham, like a beneficent genius on a sunbeam, and sets us all free. Do you suppose that such an union as that between Hateful Peg and myself could be hallowed to all eternity? No; she was inflicted upon me, like an ulcer of which I was to get rid as best I could—but not with her—no! not with her was I to lead the bitter life for ever and for aye.” (By Heavens, at this moment a tear stole out from the silken fringe of Flora’s eye, and I felt myself an unmitigated rascal.) “But let us take the other side of the question; let us suppose you, my Flora, bound by a few inconsiderate words to some wretched brute; such an animal as we men know other man can be!” (At this point I resolved to pitch into my own side without stint or mercy.) “Is there to be no remedy? Are all the sweet emotions of your soul to be the daily food for the mockery of some drunken Caliban, who might even—I tremble to think of it—raise his hand against your gentle head? The thought distracts me. Ay, and a woman may be made miserable enough, even though her husband does not, like a madman, actually forget his manhood, and strike her whom he was bound to protect from all harm at the cost of his own miserable life. Imagine yourself, Flora, married to a pompous fool; or to a man of cold, unsympathising nature, one who would not appreciate your high intellectual gifts, or bask in the radiance of your playful smile. Imagine yourself a cog in a Baker Street machine—the wife of an eminent solicitor—the mother of eight children—all as measly as young pigs, and treated as though you were not fit to direct him; not he, you.” (Flora told me not to be ‘nasty,’ when I spoke of the young pigs—but the latter part of the sentence was not without weight.) “Surely here a judicial separation would be mercy to both parties; and a dissolution a foretaste of Paradise. Yes! I could bear the thought of my own sufferings in connection with Miss Dobbs; but the idea of my Flora wrongly mated is more than I can endure.”

I need not insist further upon the argument I employed. I had resolved to go so far as to maintain that incompatibility of temper—that is, the mere fact that two human beings were miserable together, was enough to justify them in seeking for a rupture of the chain which galled without restraining them; but there should be perfect parity on both sides, and in all respects. Flora, sweet soul! seemed to me to be an average representative of British feminine feeling on such matters. The woman, happy in her marriage, esteems it as blasphemy to hint at any