Second mate

“ He supposed I was turned in.
“This is a wind to clap Staten Island in our wake.”
“Potsblitz! as der Shermons say, dere vhas veight in dese seas too.”
“Do you mean to live aft?”
“In der landt of spoons?” said he, with a smile wrinkling his face till he was scarcely the same man.
“Yaw. There is a cabin and bunk for your mattress. You are mate—first mate, entitled to live aft.”
“I shtops vhere I vhas, Mr. Fielding. I vhas no mate.”
“As much mate as I was.”
“Vell, dot might be,” said he; then added, “No, you vhas mate in your last ship. I am bos’en. I belongs forwardt.”
“I want a second mate. ”

“ Ye all who deem yourselves oppressed,
Come near, come nearer to me:
Lay off your sorrows’ burdens here
And light up your minds gloomy.
I’ve reared here a vast realm of love
Where mate seeks his mate pretty,
And what one harbors in his heart
Resounds in love's sweet ditty. ”

“ This is thus the psychological moment for man to interest his mate in the affairs he has most at heart and to make her a partner, perhaps even of some of the details, of his own vocation. This golden opportunity, however, is brief, and if it passes unimproved it will soon be forever too late and each mate will, ere long, find him- or herself starting on devious ways that will lead them ever further apart. ”

“ However much he may conceal it under assumed cynicism, worldliness, or self-seeking, the heart of every young man yearns with a great longing for the fulfilment of the beautiful dream of a life-long union with a mate. Each heart knows instinctively that it is only one's mate who can give full comprehension of all the potential greatness in one's soul, and have tender laughter for all the child-like wonder that lingers so enchantingly even in the white-haired. ”

“ To be his mate, to be capable of loving him, she must descend to his level, and that she neither could nor would do. His prey, his fuel, his wreck—that she must become, but she could be nothing else—nothing else. ”

“ Although they cannot be fathers, they can be mates otherwise. As it is, how much true companionship do you secure from me—any of you? Less than once a month do you see me more than from a distance."
"Mate with sterilies?" ”

“ The most exciting conversation on love is, of course, that between two persons of opposite sex. And in many social circles there has of late sprung up a new term. A married woman will have some particular male friend not her husband, whom she [19] laughingly refers to as her “playmate.” With this “mate” she plays at love and love-making under the guise of serious discussion. In some coteries, the married woman’s playmate may be some other woman’s husband, but the favourites for playmates are unmarried men. ”

“ The night birds chanted their congratulations from the tree tops, and reading his own thoughts into their songs he imagined he heard them saying, "Let each one find his mate; let each one find his mate." ”

“ In considering whether any particular person would be a good mate for you, ask yourself these seven questions, based on the psychological needs you will want to satisfy:
Will This Mate Bring You Social Approval? You will want a mate that other people will like, that other people will admire and respect. You thus need a mate who is adept at getting along with other people. Will your friends like him and will the mate’s friends like you? Will your parents think approvingly of the marriage? ”

“ She teaches them to fly, to find their food, and to detect their enemies. She is true to her mate, and her mate is true and kind to her. As the days of summer shorten, and the cool, long nights warn of approaching autumn, she leads her children away from the old place, she and her faithful mate, out into the wide old world. ”

“ You might walk along a country road 'ere, alone in the world, and in the first house you'd stop at to ask for a drink, you'd meet someone who'd want you as a partner for life. You can pick up a mate in no time. ”

“ Make your own little world and your own house first of all, keep that right side up whatever you do, and marry your mate.... That, I suppose, is what I should do—if I had a mate.... But people of my sort, luckily for the world, don't get made in pairs. ”

“ They will become more independent of each other unless [202] during the first few months of marriage they have explored each other’s interests and found things they can do together.
If he is to become anything more than the provider and she anything more than the housekeeper, they must establish a sound basis for companionship. How can this be done? The essentials of human companionship are pretty universal for any two people whether they are mates or just close friends. ”

“ He seated himself and looked into the skies beyond the peaks across the valley.
“Ten years ago I met my first mate. The meeting was fortunate for both. She was a woman of gentle birth, of beautiful spirit. Our courtship was ideal. We thought alike, we felt alike, she loved my profession even—an unusual trait in a woman. ”

“ One of America's foremost writers declares repeatedly throughout his excellent novels that judgment has never yet entered into the selection of a mate,—that sentiment and emotion alone decide the after life of every couple who are wed. ”

“ I have chosen my mate, and I may never marry him. I do not know whether he would marry me. He has my soul. I have no shame in saying I love him. It is to love goodness, greatness of heart. He is a respecter of women—of all women; not only the fortunate. He is the friend of the weaker everywhere. ”

“ And then what a charming subject for conversation would be the gallant and generous last partings between man and wife! Each, perhaps, a new mate in eye, and rejoicing secretly in the manumission, could afford to be complaisantly sorrowful in appearance. ”

“ I would be your wife most gladly!"
(Here she twirled her fingers madly,)
"But in England I've a mate! Yes! you've asked me far too late, For in England I've a mate, Mr. ”

“ Johnson pronounced a second marriage to be "The triumph of Hope over Experience." Others who are less epigrammatic affirm that to take a second partner is the highest compliment that can be paid to the departed first. ”

“ It is as natural to want a mate as to want bread, and a thousand times in my work and in my wanderings I have thought of a mate and desired a mate. A mate—not a possession. It is a need almost naively simple. If only one could have a woman who thought of one and with one! ”

“ There is a period when the male is very active in his rushing of the female—I suppose to make sure of his desire, a mate—but this phase of courtship plays no part in the act of copulation, which I have seen enacted early in the morning, a quiet, matter-of-fact performance. ”

“ Then I tried to think of life alone, of going solitary through the rest of my days—and I knew that my Maker had left me too warm-blooded and too dependent on the companionship of a mate ever to turn back to single harness. I couldn’t live without a man. He might be a sorry mix-up of good and bad, but I, the Eternal Female, would crave him as a mate. ”

“ The four seasons were symbolized by the hunt of the man for his mate: he is afield in Autumn, on horseback; in Winter, he first finds his new mate; in the Spring, the maid watches her sheep feeding on the hills; and in Summertime, the man is seen leading his mate to a couch, his arms already around her waist. ”

“ The person who wants to win a mate must put three thoughts in the prospective mate’s head. You must make that person feel the need of a mate ... that you are the person who can best fit that need ... and that the time is ripe for marriage.
First, let’s consider some of the things a girl can do to get a man thinking along those lines:
—She should talk about the man’s basic needs in a subtle, impersonal way by discussing such things as good food, comfortable furniture, fireplaces, a place where one can bring friends. ”

“ We know of young men today who would seem to be excellent prospects for mates—and they actually favor the idea of marrying—but we would be willing to predict that they will be bachelors. They are too fussy. They find something in every girl they go with that does not conform to their idea of an ideal mate.
How do we come by our ideals for mates? During adolescence and childhood both boys and girls form in their mind some kind of a “dream hero or heroine,” a sort of “phantom lover.” He or she is a composite of all the qualifications they want their future mate to have. ”

“ Any person contemplating marriage shows lack of foresight if he fails to consider the attachments his prospective mate may have to close relatives, or if he fails to weigh the chances that these relatives will ever live with the couple, and the outcome if they do. ”

“ The search for a mate is a quest for an understanding soul clothed in a body beautiful, but unlike our own.
In the modern world, those who set off on high endeavors or who consciously separate themselves from the ordinary course of social life, are comparatively few, and it is not to them that I am speaking. ”

“ If we select our nuptial mate with care and sound judgment, paying more attention to the internal rather than the external qualities, treating her with the utmost consideration of character, first studying and then adapting ourselves to them, we shall not find sharp edges but smooth sides, and we shall never come into collision with them. ”

“ Of the fitful wren, incessantly singing of love to his mate, yet who fails to assist her in nest-building, and who proves but an indifferent provider for his young family? Of the lonely phoebe, calling in plaintive, mysterious tones to a mate unresponsive to his sorrowful beseechings? ”

“ In the particular society of his mate he attains a clearer sight of any spot, any taint which her beauty has contracted from this world, and is able to point it out, and this with mutual joy that they are now able, without offence, to indicate blemishes and hindrances in each other, and give to each all help and comfort in curing the same. ”

“ One question there is I would fain have resolved in all sincerity and without concealment of any kind by some good lady that hath made the journey,—to wit, when women be married a second time, how they be affected toward the memory of their first husband. ’Tis a general maxim hereanent, that later friendships and enmities do always make the earlier ones forgot; in like wise will a second marriage bury the thought of the first. ”

“ For very few indeed of these attributes have any connexion whatsoever with true, desirable manliness in a mate, and the young man who [Pg 83] has been tamed into making a trustworthy companion to a single positive girl in her games and her walks, is more often a torture machine than a delight as her husband in later years. ”

“ When one of the pair discovers what its mate is doing, it, of course, gets angry and scolds it. The other returns the compliment. Probably the next step is that each examines the handiwork of the other and thinks very little of it. ”

“ Marriage counselors have noticed the significant fact that the individual who makes friends readily, who likes his work and is successful in it, is also the person who tends to choose an excellent mate for himself and work out with that mate a happy marriage. ”

“ It is doubtful that you—or anyone—will find a mate who fits letter perfect into all the qualifications we have mentioned in the course of the book as desirable in mates, but that is not important. What is important is that your mate should fit into the general pattern of the kind of person you need, and should be free from the really serious short-comings we have mentioned.
Perhaps the most important single thought we can leave with you is that the person you marry should be one who will give you a sense of well-being. Marriage to this person should end your vague feelings of restlessness. ”

“ The girl wants a man who is not discourteous or sloppy, who will get to work at the time he is supposed to report, who will not embarrass her in public by doing things that will make them criticized by others.
Will This Mate Be Affectionate With You? We all want to be appreciated, to be approved by our own mate, to be given spontaneous tokens of affection, to be told that we are loved. It is tied up with our desire for praise and recognition. ”

“ This unconscious tendency to test the husband, based on the biological necessity of choosing a mate at least slightly stronger spiritually, psychically, mentally than herself, determines much of the actions of a maid with a man. ”

“ But even if you do marry, what are the chances you will get a mate you like?
The answer depends a great deal on who you are. We can assure you that such mates will not come automatically. Right now there are at least a million married couples who are waiting to get a divorce. Millions of other couples tolerate each other but are not happy by any standards we could apply to them. ”

“ But man, who wants his mate all out of season as well as in it, has a double duty to perform, and must himself rouse, charm, and stimulate her to the local readiness which would have been to some extent naturally prepared for him had he waited till her own desire welled up. ”

“ You will not, of course, suppose that every bachelor among us finds his mates at the first wooing in this universal Marriage Chorus. On the contrary, the process is by most of us many times repeated. Few are the hearts whose happy lot it is at once to recognize in each other's voices the partner intended for them by Providence, and to fly into a reciprocal and perfectly harmonious embrace. With most of us the courtship is of long duration. ”

“ When two people of vastly different mental equipment marry, the less-endowed mate is apt to develop very strong feelings of inferiority, and the two may find it very hard to select interests and activities to share. The more intelligent one unconsciously may develop a superior attitude that may be patronizing or impatient. ”

“ Your friend, who has a wife that he loves, and that loves him, writes back kindly—“hoping you may be happy;” and hoping so yourself, you light your cigar—one of your last bachelor cigars—with the margin of his letter.
The match goes off with a brilliant marriage; at which you receive a very elegant welcome from your wife’s spinster cousins—and drink a great deal of champagne with her bachelor uncles. And as you take the dainty hand of your bride—very magnificent under that bridal wreath, and with her face lit up by a brilliant glow—your eye, and your soul, for the first time, grow full. ”