does not run after the gentleman, but, on the contrary, shows her
maiden modesty by giving him as hard a chase as she can, she still
delicately paves the way for osculation by throwing the
pocket-handkerchief. And, in the Christmas fights under the mistletoe
(if we may take Mr. Dickens as an authority), slapping, and even
pinching in moderation, are considered allowable--perhaps we ought to
say proper--on the lady's part; but scratching--serious scratching, we
mean, which would make her admirer's face look next morning as if he had
been taking liberties with a savage bird or a cat--is thought not merely
unnecessary, but unfair.

The difference between civilized and savage woman may perhaps help to
indicate the reason why, now-a-days, match-making should, as a matter of
fact, be associated with husband-hunting in spite of the theory that it
is the woman who has to be hunted, not the man. Popular phraseology has
an awkward trick of making people unconsciously countenance the theories
against which they most vehemently protest. Husband-hunting is a far
more generally obnoxious word than even the much-injured match-making,
simply because it flies in the face of the pet theory which we have
described. But, if the theory really hold good in modern practice, why
should man, not woman, be recognised as the professional match-maker's
victim and legitimate game? Why does not wife-hunting, the word which
this theory entitles us to expect, take its proper place in society?
Heiress-hunting, indeed, is well known, but this can scarcely be
considered a form of wife-hunting, for it is not the woman who is the
object of pursuit, but her money-bags. We have the word heiress-hunting
for the very obvious reason that heiresses are recognised game. The word
husband-hunting exists for the same reason.

Are we to infer from the non-existence, or at any rate the
non-appearance in good society, of the word wife-hunting, that the
practice is anything but common--that, since a hunt necessarily implies
pursuit on one side and flight on the other, a man cannot well be said
to hunt a woman who is either engaged in hunting him, or else only too
ready to meet him halfway? Are we gradually tending towards an advanced
stage of civilization in which woman will be formally recognized as the
pursuer, and man as the pursued? We are not bold enough to take under
our protection a view so glaringly heterodox, but still we think it
only common justice to point