Belief in woman must be part of the religion of all men who are worthy of their mothers. By this I do not mean that one must take for gospel her every word and act, for the gift of dissimulation is a special dispensation of Nature for her protection against what is aggressive or destructive in man; just as to the female of the African butterfly _Papilio merope_ is accorded the power of protecting herself, during certain seasons, against the depredations of birds, by assuming the colour of the malodorous _Amauris niavius_, which is particularly obnoxious to the feathered tribes. And as we recognise the humour of this comedy of the mimic butterfly and the cunningly duped bird, so do we perceive, if we be true critics of the stage of life, that nine-tenths of its comedy are due to the protective dissimulation of woman in her relations with man. Else were it all drama, with an excess of tragedy, and that were dreary. Woman is full of quaint conceit and subtle humour, whether she know it herself or not, and we love her all the more for this, especially since the laugh is often against ourselves. Confidence between man and woman must always be comparative, and absolute trust a practicable impossibility, since the differences of temperament preclude a perfect understanding. A man can never see a woman entirely as she is, or as one of her own sex may see her, and _vice versâ_. Yet a woman is more likely to comprehend a man and his motives than he is to comprehend her; for a woman, while more sensitively sympathetic, judges instantly by instinct, straight and sure as the crow flies. A man, on the other hand, travels the railroad of reason, where there are many shuntings, and a single mistaken signal may upset the whole train of his logic. In judging a woman’s motives and feelings a man argues from his own, and deduces conclusions which are, more often than not, radically erroneous.