But it wouldn't be right."
"Not right! Oh! why not right, Dora?"
"Because it would spoil both of us. You ask me to make any thing of
you I like; but that is not the way. It is you yourself that must
make a man of yourself. If I should try to do it, I should only make
a puppet of you, and a conceited, tyrannical woman of myself. It
would not be good for me to rule as you want me to do; and surely no
man would deliberately say it would be good for him to be ruled, and
that by his wife."
There was a touch of scorn in the tone of the last words; and Karl's
check flushed hotly, as he said,--
"It's hard that you should despise me for loving you so well that I
am ready to forget pride and manly dignity, and every thing else,
for the sake of it."
"No; but, Karl, don't you see yourself what an injury such a love
must be to you? Forget pride and manly dignity and self-respect do
you say? A true love, a good love, would make you cherish them as
you never did before; would make you claim and hold every inch of
manhood that is in you, so that you might feel yourself worthy of
that love. O, Karl! never again offer to put yourself under the foot
of any woman, but wait till you meet one whom you can hold by the
hand, and lead along, keeping equal step with yourself, and both
pressing forward to a common goal.
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