And she does like her, though this little pink and white pet of mine is
a new revelation to her, and puzzles her amazingly. She would have been
glad if I had married Julia Hamilton of Boston; but those Boston girls
are too strong-minded and positive to suit me. Julia is nice, it is
true, and pretty and highly educated, and Fan says she has brains and
would make a splendid wife. As Fan had never seen Daisy she did not, of
course, mean to hint that she had not brains, but I suspect even now she
would be better pleased if Julia were here, but I should not. Julia is
self-reliant; Daisy is not. Julia has opinions of her own and asserts
them, too; Daisy does not. Julia can sew and run a machine; Daisy
cannot. Julia gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night; Daisy
does neither. Nobody ever waits for Julia; everybody waits for Daisy.
Julia reads scientific works and dotes on metaphysics; Daisy does not
know the meaning of the word. In short, Julia is a strong, high-toned,
energetic, independent woman, while Daisy is--a little innocent,
confiding girl, whom I would rather have without brains than all the
Boston women like Julia with brains!
And yet I sometimes wish she did care for books, and was more interested
in what interests me. I have tried reading aloud to her an hour every
evening, but she generally goes to sleep or steals up behind me to look
over my shoulder and see how near I am to the end of the chapter, and
when I reach it she says: "Excuse me, but I have just thought of
something I must tell Zillah about the dress I want to wear to-morrow.
I'll be back in a moment"; and off she goes, and our reading is ended
for that time, for I notice she never returns. The dress is of more
importance than the book, and I find her at ten or eleven trying to
decide whether black or white or blue is most becoming to her. Poor
Daisy! I fear she had no proper training at home. Indeed, she told me
the other day that from her earliest recollection she had been taught
that the main object of her life was to marry young and to marry money.
Of course she did not mean anything or know how it sounded, but I would
rather she had not said it, even though she had refused a millionaire
for me, who can hardly be called rich as riches are rated these days. If
Dick Trevylian should fail to meet his payment I should be very poor,
and then what would become of Daisy, to whom the luxuries which money
buys are so necessary?
(Here followed several other entries in the journal, consisting mostly
of rhapsodies on Daisy, and then came the following:)