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 “Are all marriages unhappy?”

“Millions of marriages are unhappy: if everybody confessed the truth, perhaps all are more or less so.”

“You are always vexed when you are asked to come and marry a couple—why?”

“Because one does not like to act as accessory to the commission of a piece of pure folly.”

Mr. Helstone spoke so readily, he seemed rather glad of the opportunity to give his niece a piece of his mind on this point. Emboldened by the impunity which had hitherto attended her questions, she went a little further:—

“But why,” said she, “should it be pure folly? If two people like each other, why shouldn’t they consent to live together?”

“They tire of each other—they tire of each other in a month. A yokefellow is not a companion; he or she is a fellow-sufferer.”

It was by no means naïve simplicity which inspired Caroline’s next remark: it was a sense of antipathy to such opinions, and of displeasure at him who held them.

“One would think you had never been married, uncle: one would think you were an old bachelor.”

“Practically, I am so.”

“But you have been married. Why were you so inconsistent as to marry?”

“Every man is mad once or twice in his life.”

“So you tired of my aunt, and my aunt of you, and you were miserable together?”