Page:Romance & Reality 1.pdf/234

228 haunted her dreams. The only communication between lovers was the handing the holy water in the cathedral, a guitar softly touched at night, or perhaps the rare occurrence of meeting at a festival. In all the old novelists and poets, love at first sight is a common event, because it was such in actual life. Our modern easiness of manners, and freedom of intercourse, develope the same feeling, though in a different manner,—we no longer lose our hearts so suddenly, because there is no necessity for such haste; we talk of answering tastes, our ancestors thought of answering eyes,—we require a certain number of quadrilles, and a certain quantity of conversation, before the young pair can be supposed to form an attachment; but allow me to say, I do not see why it is so much more rational to talk than to look oneself into love. No: judge Juliet according to the manners of a time of masks, veils, serenades, and seclusion, and you will find the picture worked out in colours as delicate as they are natural." The defence of one woman is a man's best flattery to the whole sex, even as the abuse of them in general is but a bad compliment to any individual.