The "Supreme Conceit"
It pleases a man very much to be told that he "knows the world," even though his acquaintance be limited to the flesh and the devil—a gentleman, by the way, who is much misunderstood and whose faults are persistently exaggerated. But man's supreme conceit is in regard to his personal appearance. Let a single entry in a laboratory note-book suffice for proof.
Time, evening. Man is reading a story in a current magazine to the Girl he is calling upon.
Man. "Are you interested in this?"
Girl. "Certainly, but I can think of other things too, can't I?"
Man. "That depends on the 'other things.' What are they?"
Girl. (Calmly.) "I was just thinking that you are an extremely handsome man, but of course you know that."
Man. (Crimsoning to his temples.) "You flatter me!" (Resumes reading.)
Girl. (Awaits developments.)
Man. (After a little.) "I didn't know you thought I was good-looking."
Girl. (Demurely.) "Didn't you?"
Man. (Clears his throat and continues the story.)
Man. (After a few minutes.) "Did you ever hear anybody else say that?"
Girl. "Say what?"
Man. "Why, that I was—that I was—well, good-looking, you know?"
Girl. "Oh, yes! Lots of people!"
Man. (After reading half a page.) "I don't think this is so very interesting, do you?"
Girl. "No, it isn't. It doesn't carry out the promise of its beginning."
Man. (Closes magazine and wanders aimlessly toward the mirror in the mantel.)
Man. "Which way do you like my hair; this way, or parted in the middle?"
Girl. "I don't know—this way, I guess. I've never seen it parted in the middle."
Man. (Taking out pocket comb and rapidly parting his hair in the middle.) "There! Which way do you like it?"
Girl. (Judicially.) "I don't know. It's really a very hard question to decide."
Man. (Reminiscently.) "I've gone off my looks a good deal lately. I used to be a lot better looking than I am now."
Girl. (Softly.) "I'm glad I didn't know you then."
Man. (In apparent astonishment.) "Why?"
Girl. "Because I might not have been heart whole, as I am now."
(Long silence.)
Man. (With sudden enthusiasm.) "I'll tell you, though, I really do look well in evening dress."
Girl. "I haven't a doubt of it, even though I've never seen you wear it."
Man. (After brief meditation.) "Let's go and hear Melba next week, will you? I meant to ask you when I first came in, but we got to reading."
Girl. "I shall be charmed."
Next day, Girl gets a box of chocolates and a dozen American Beauties—in February at that.
Dimples and Dress Clothes
Tell a man he has a dimple and he will say "where?" in pleased surprise, meanwhile putting his finger straight into it. He has studied that dimple in the mirror too many times to be unmindful of its geography.
Let the woman dearest to a man say, tenderly: "You were so handsome to-night, dear—I was proud of you." See his face light up with noble, unselfish joy, because he has given such pleasure to others!
All the married men at evening receptions have gone because they "look so well in evening dress," and because "so few men can wear dress clothes really well." In truth, it does require distinction and grace of bearing, if a man would not be mistaken for a waiter.
Man's conceit is not love of himself but of his fellow-men. The man who is in love with himself need not fear that any woman will ever become a serious rival. Not unfrequently, when a man asks a woman to marry him, he means that he wants her to help him love himself, and if, blinded by her own feeling, she takes him for her captain, her pleasure craft becomes a pirate ship, the colours change to a black flag with a sinister sign, and her inevitable destiny is the coral reef.
Palmistry
Palmistry does very well for a beginning if a man is inclined to be shy. It leads by gentle and almost imperceptible degrees to that most interesting of all subjects, himself, and to that tactful comment, dearest of all to the masculine heart; "You are not like other men!"
A man will spend an entire evening, utterly oblivious of the lapse of time, while a woman subjects him to careful analysis. But sympathy, rather than sarcasm, must be her guide—if she wants him to come again. A man will make a comrade of the woman who stimulates him to higher achievement, but he will love the one who makes herself a mirror for his conceit.
Men claim that women cannot keep a secret, but it is a common failing. A man will always tell some one person the thing which is told him in confidence. If he is married, he tells his wife. Then the exclusive bit of news is rapidly syndicated, and by gentle degrees, the secret is diffused through the community. This is the most pathetic thing in matrimony—the regularity with which husbands relate the irregularities of their friends. Very little of the world's woe is caused by silence, however it may be in fiction and the drama.
Exchange of Confidence
In return for the generous confidence regarding other people's doings, the married man is made conversant with those things which his wife deems it right and proper for him to know. And he is not unhappy, for it isn't what he doesn't know that troubles a man, but what he knows he doesn't know.
The masculine nature is less capable of concealment than the feminine. Where men are frankly selfish, women are secretly so. Man's vices are few and comprehensive; woman's petty and innumerable. Any man who is not in the penitentiary has at most but three or four, while a woman will hide a dozen under her social mask and defy detection.
Women are said to be fickle, but are they more so than men? A man's ideal is as variable as the wind. What he thinks is his ideal of woman is usually a glorified image of the last girl he happened to admire. The man who has had a decided preference for blondes all his life, finally installs a brown-eyed deity at his hearthstone. If he has been fond of petite and coquettish damsels, he marries some Diana moulded on large lines and unconcerned as to mice.
A man will ride, row, and swim with one girl and marry another who is afraid of horses, turns pale at the mention of a boat, and who would look forward to an interview with His Satanic Majesty with more ease and confidence than to a dip in the summer sea.
Portia and Carmen
Theoretically, men admire "reasonable women," with the uncommon quality which is called "common sense," but it is the woman of caprice, the sweet, illogical despot of a thousand moods, who is most often and most tenderly loved. Man is by nature a discoverer. It is not beauty which holds him, but rather mystery and charm. To see the one woman through all the changing moods—to discern Portia through Carmen's witchery—is the thing above all others which captivates a man.
The Dorcas Ideal
Deep in his heart, man cherishes the Dorcas ideal. The old, lingering notions of womanliness are not quite dispelled, but in this, as