"As soon as a young man advances toward a woman, directly he falls under
the influence of this opium, and loses his head. Long ago I felt ill at
ease when I saw a woman too well adorned,--whether a woman of the people
with her red neckerchief and her looped skirt, or a woman of our own
society in her ball-room dress. But now it simply terrifies me. I see in
it a danger to men, something contrary to the laws; and I feel a desire
to call a policeman, to appeal for defence from some quarter, to demand
that this dangerous object be removed.

"And this is not a joke, by any means. I am convinced, I am sure, that
the time will come--and perhaps it is not far distant--when the world
will understand this, and will be astonished that a society could exist
in which actions as harmful as those which appeal to sensuality by
adorning the body as our companions do were allowed. As well set traps
along our public streets, or worse than that."


CHAPTER X.

"That, then, was the way in which I was captured. I was in love, as
it is called; not only did she appear to me a perfect being, but I
considered myself a white blackbird. It is a commonplace fact that there
is no one so low in the world that he cannot find some one viler than
himself, and consequently puff with pride and self-contentment. I was in
that situation. I did not marry for money. Interest was foreign to the
affair, unlike the marriages of most of my acquaintances, who married
either for money or for relations. First, I was rich, she was poor.
Second, I was especially proud of the fact that, while others married
with an intention of continuing their polygamic life as bachelors, it
was my firm intention to live monogamically after my engagement and the