But you would want me to love you! Manella, there is no such thing as love!--not in this world! There is animal attraction,--the magnetism of the male for the female, the female for the male,--the magnetism that pulls the opposite sexes together in order to keep this planet supplied with an ever new crop of fools,--but love! No, Manella! There is no such thing!" Here he gently took her two hands away from their tightly folded position on her bosom and held them in his own.
"No such thing, my dear!" he went on, speaking softly and soothingly, as though to a child--"Except in the dreams of poets, and you--fortunately!--know nothing about poetry! The wild animal in you is attracted to the tame, ruminating animal in me,--and you would be my woman, though I would not be your man.

I quite believe that it is the natural instinct of the female to select her mate,--but, though the rule may hold good in the forest world, it doesn't always work among the human herd.

Man considers that he has the right of selection--quite a mistake of his I'm sure, for he has no real sense of beauty or fitness, and generally selects most vilely.

All the same he is an obstinate brute, and sticks to his brutish ideas as a snail sticks to its shell.

_I_ am an obstinate brute!--I am absolutely convinced that I have the right to choose my own woman, if I want one--which I don't,--or if ever I do want one--which I never shall!" She drew her hands quickly from his grasp.