CHAPTER XXXVI--SNOBS AND MARRIAGE
'We Bachelors in Clubs are very much obliged to you,' says my old school
and college companion, Essex Temple, 'for the opinion which you hold of
us. You call us selfish, purple-faced, bloated, and other pretty names.
You state, in the simplest possible terms, that we shall go to the
deuce. You bid us rot in loneliness, and deny us all claims to honesty,
conduct, decent Christian life. Who are you, Mr. Snob, to judge us. Who
are you, with your infernal benevolent smirk and grin, that laugh at all
our generation?
'I will tell you my case,' says Essex Temple; 'mine and my sister
Polly's, and you may make what you like of it; and sneer at old maids,
and bully old bachelors, if you will.
'I will whisper to you confidentially that my sister was engaged to
Serjeant Shirker--a fellow whose talents one cannot deny, and be hanged
to them, but whom I have always known to be mean, selfish, and a prig.
However, women don't see these faults in the men whom Love throws in
their way. Shirker, who has about as much warmth as an eel, made up to
Polly years and years ago, and was no bad match for a briefless
barrister, as he was then.
Have you ever read Lord Eldon's Life? Do you remember how the sordid old
Snob narrates his going out to purchase twopence-worth of sprats, which
he and Mrs. Scott fried between them? And how he parades his humility,
and exhibits his miserable poverty--he who, at that time, must have been
making a thousand pounds a year? Well, Shirker was just as proud of his
prudence--just as thankful for his own meanness, and of course would not
marry without a competency.
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