Romantic Love and Personal Beauty Author:Henry Theophilus Finck Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Of Gallantry I have not succeeded in discovering any traces in the records of savage life, except possibly in the case of the natives of Kamtchatka, where the wo... more »oer has to go into service for his bride, and during this time endeavours constantly to lighten her labours and make himself agreeable to her. So far as Gallantry occurs, it is more likely to be a feminine trait—as among one of the North American Indian tribes, where the maiden cooks her suitor's game, and sends him back the best morsels with presents; or as with another tribe, the Osages, where the maidens pay court to the warriors by offering them ears of corn. As for the remaining characters of Romantic Love, which require a vivid imagination and persistent emotions for their realisation, it would be useless to look for them in Savagedom—except perhaps in those infinitesimal proportions in which various chemical substances are found by analysts in mineral waters. The following may be offered as an approximate list of the ingredients in the Love of savage and semi-civilised peoples :— Selfishness Inconstancy . Jealousy . Coyness Individual Preference Personal Beauty Monopoly Pride of Possession Sympathy Gallantry . Self-Sacrifice Ecstatic Adoration Mixed Emotions 25-7684 20-3701 207904 10-5523 5-0073 5-7002 7-3024 4-5082 o-oooo 0-0006 Traces V CAN AMERICAN NEGROES LOVE ? It is a very interesting question how far the negroes transplanted to America, who have adopted so many of the habits and ways of thinking of their white neighbours, are capable of forming a true romantic attachment, characterised by the various traits described in this work. I have not been able to find any conclusive evidence on this head; and should any readers of this book...« less