"Well, and now it so chanced that everything combined -- my condition, her becoming dress, and the satisfactory boating. It had failed twenty times but now it succeeded. Just like a trap! I am not joking. You see nowadays marriages are arranged that way -- like traps. What is the natural way? The lass is ripe, she must be given in marriage. It seems very simple if the girl is not a fright and there are men wanting to marry. That is how it was done in olden times. The lass was grown up and her parents arranged the marriage. So it was done, and is done, among all mankind -- Chinese, Hindus, Mohammedans, and among our own working classes; so it is done among at least ninety-nine percent of the human race. Only among one percent or less, among us libertines, has it been discovered that that is not right, and something new has been invented. And what is this novelty? It is that the maidens sit around and the men walk about, as at a bazaar, choosing. And the maidens wait and think, but dare not say: ‘Me, please! ' ‘No, me! ' ‘Not her, but me! ' ‘Look what shoulders and other things I have! ' And we men stroll around and look, and are very pleased. ‘Yes, I know! I won't be caught! ' They stroll about and look and are very pleased that everything is arranged like that for them. And then in an unguarded moment -- snap! He is caught!"
"Then how ought it to be done? " I asked. "Should the woman propose?"
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