She had the tact also to encourage him to go out of an
evening whenever he had a mind, without in the least caring that he
should take her too--and this suited Ernest very well. He was, I should
say, much happier in his married life than people generally are.
At first it had been very painful to him to meet any of his old friends,
as he sometimes accidentally did, but this soon passed; either they cut
him, or he cut them; it was not nice being cut for the first time or two,
but after that, it became rather pleasant than not, and when he began to
see that he was going ahead, he cared very little what people might say
about his antecedents. The ordeal is a painful one, but if a man's moral
and intellectual constitution are naturally sound, there is nothing which
will give him so much strength of character as having been well cut.
It was easy for him to keep his expenditure down, for his tastes were not
luxurious. He liked theatres, outings into the country on a Sunday, and
tobacco, but he did not care for much else, except writing and music. As
for the usual run of concerts, he hated them. He worshipped Handel; he
liked Offenbach, and the airs that went about the streets, but he cared
for nothing between these two extremes.
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