d men succeed through the qualities
which they do not possess. By this he meant to say that to cope with the
pushing crowd, you must not be too scrupulous, or you will let everybody
pass before you.

A worse cynic, one of the blackest type and deepest dye, went as far as
to say: 'The way to succeed is to have unbounded impudence, popular
manners, absence of scruple, and complete ignorance of everything.'

But, then, take it for granted that this cynic was only a disappointed
failure. You will constantly hear the man who has failed in life
exclaim: 'Oh, if I had not always wished to remain perfectly honest, I
could have succeeded like many others I know.'

Just as you hear women who fail to get engagements on the stage or the
concert platform remark: 'If I had had no objection to obtaining
engagements in the way some women do, I would have made my mark--but I
am not one of that sort.'

At the risk of appearing paradoxical, and even cynical, I will venture
to say that in love, and in matrimony especially, certain great
qualities are more detrimental to the happiness of women than many of
their defects. And if this is a correct statement, to what shortcoming
of man are we going to attribute it?

I know that on reading this some women will exclaim: 'Shame on you to
say such a thing!' Very well, will you listen to me? Look around you,
among all your circles of friends and acquaintances, of relatives even,
and tell me if, as a rule, the young girl who is vain, selfish,
coquettish, a flirt even, has not better chances of marriage, and is not
sought after rather than the simple, unaffected, devoted, intellectual
girl? Tell me if the bumptious rose does not generally carry the day
over the modest, retiring violet?'

Of course, I know that you will say to me, 'You may be right; men--I
mean most men--are caught, like mackerel, by shining bait; but when a
man is married, surely he is not slow to recognise which of the two is
the right one to have as a wife, and to appreciate all the qualities and
virtues of the second one.'

Well, you are wrong--wrong as can be. Look around you again, study now
the married couples that you know, and you will have to confess that the
wife who is coquettish, frivolous, clever, will know how to make herself
respected, and even feared, by her husband much more than the other.

That husband will pay to her his best attentions, will be proud of her,
and will work like a slave in order to meet al