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And, besides, I'm always suspicious of those skinny people. A skinny man's capable of anything. I've never come across a decent one yet. That one's as flat as a board. And he's got such an ugly face, too! Though I'm sixty-five and more, I'd precious soon send him about his business if he came a-courting of me!" She said this because she had a shrewd idea of how matters were likely to turn out.
You fellows nowadays, you don't know what fun is, nor how to go a-courting, nor anything.... I was at old Redford that year, and she was at Wellwood, and all through the sleet and snow I rode there after dark, tied my horse to a tree, crept up that nut-walk you know it? and round by the east terrace to the porch, and laid my valentine on the door-step, and clanged the bell, and hid behind the yew-fence till the man came out to get it.
The maternal element in her nature sympathized with his loneliness and with the marks it had left upon his soul. For the rest he was neither a village cut-up like Con Skerly, nor a solemn mass of conceit like Royal Crews; nor patronizing like young Lawyer Wetherell; nor vaguely repulsive like old Cap'n Baldy Todd, who came furtively a-courting her. Link was different. And she liked him.
As a fisherman and pedestrian I had been able to come at the stream only at certain points: now the most private and secluded retreats of the nymph would be opened to me; every bend and eddy, every cove hedged in by swamps or passage walled in by high alders, would be at the beck of my paddle. Whom shall one take with him when he goes a-courting Nature? This is always a vital question.
He has a horror of 'going a-courting, as you say; you would have to give him a drop into a family, just as in England they give a man a drop into the next world." During the uproar that usually marks the end of a first night, the flute delivered his invitation to the conductor. Pons accepted gleefully; and, for the first time in three months, Schmucke saw a smile on his friend's face.
When a young tradesman in Holland or Germany goes a-courting, I am told the first question the young woman asks of him, or perhaps her friends for her, is, 'Are you able to pay the charges? that is to say, in English, 'Are you able to keep a wife when you have got her? The question is a little Gothic indeed, and would be but a kind of gross way of receiving a lover here, according to our English good breeding; but there is a great deal of reason in the inquiry, that must be confessed; and he that is not able to pay the charges, should never begin the journey; for, be the wife what she will, the very state of life that naturally attends the marrying a woman, brings with it an expense so very considerable, that a tradesman ought to consider very well of it before he engages.
At last, after talking the matter over with all his friends, he decided positively to go a-courting. Widow Denison came to his house and he says: "I took her up into my chamber and discoursed Thorowly with her: told her I intended to visit her next Lecture Day. She said 'twould be talk'd of, I answered: In such Cases persons must run the Gantlet. Gave her an Oration."
He had no wish to have the old folks select his bride, for if the truth were told, his choice was already made. He had simply lacked the courage to go a-courting! The next morning, after making an unusually careful toilet, he took his best horse and rode to a point overlooking the path by which the girls went for water.
When Joey crept down again a minute later, Picotee was sitting aloof and silent, and he accordingly singled her out to speak to. 'Such a lark, Picotee! he whispered. 'Berta's a-courting of her young man. Would you like to see how they carries on a bit? 'Dearly I should! said Picotee, the pupils of her eyes dilating. Joey conducted her to the top of the basement stairs, and told her to listen.
One by one the others all leave, except one man; he offers to take Uli a-courting. Uli half yields, and is led into a dark alley where the others set upon him. Freneli, Joggeli, and especially Elsie are put out, the latter because she is wont to spread out her finery on the table and Uli is in her way. But Uli wins her over by admiring the finery, and Elsie begins to set her cap for him.
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