proofs of their love
as call for no special effort of self-immolation. They do not much care
whether you eat well, sleep well, keep your spirits up, or enjoy good
health, nor do they ever do anything to obtain for you those blessings
if they have it in their power; but, should you be confronting a bullet,
or have fallen into the water, or stand in danger of being burnt, or
have had your heart broken in a love affair--well, for all these
things they are prepared if the occasion should arise. Moreover, people
addicted to love of such a self-sacrificing order are invariably
proud of their love, exacting, jealous, distrustful, and--strange to
tell--anxious that the object of their adoration should incur perils (so
that they may save it from calamity, and console it thereafter) and even
be vicious (so that they may purge it of its vice).

Suppose, now, that you are living in the country with a wife who loves
you in this self-sacrificing manner. You may be healthy and contented,
and have occupations which interest you, while, on the other hand,
your wife may be too weak to superintend the household work (which,
in consequence, will be left to the servants), or to look after the
children (who, in consequence, will be left to the nurses), or to put
her heart into any work whatsoever: and all because she loves nobody and
nothing but yourself. She may be patently ill, yet she will say not a
word to you about it, for fear of distressing you. She may be patently
ennuyee, yet for your sake she will be prepared to be so for the rest
of her life. She may be patently depressed because you stick so
persistently to your occupations (whether sport, books, farming, state
service, or anything else) and see clearly that they are doing you harm;
yet, for all that, she will keep silence, and suffer it to be so. Yet,
should you but fall sick--and, despite her own ailments and your prayers
that she will not distress herself in vain, your loving wife will remain
sitting inseparably by your bedside. Every moment you will feel her
sympathetic gaze resting upon you and, as it were, saying: "There! I
told you so, but it is all one to me, and I shall not leave you." In the
morning you maybe a little better, and move into another room. The room,
however, will be insufficiently warmed or set in order; the soup which
alone you feel you could eat will not have been cooked; nor will any
medicine have been sent for. Yet, though worn out with night watching,