Should a single closet be constructed there, you are a lost man! Above
all, accustom your wife, during the honeymoon, to bestow especial
pains in the neatness of her apartment; let nothing put off that. If
you do not habituate her to be minutely particular in this respect, if
the same objects are not always found in the same places, she will
allow things to become so untidy, that you will not be able to see
that there are two pounds of silk more or less in her room.
The curtains of your apartments ought to be of a stuff which is quite
transparent, and you ought to contract the habit in the evenings of
walking outside so that madame may see you come right up to the window
just out of absent-mindedness. In a word, with regard to windows, let
the sills be so narrow that even a sack of flour cannot be set up on
them.
If the apartment of your wife can be arranged on these principles, you
will be in perfect safety, even if there are niches enough there to
contain all the saints of Paradise. You will be able, every evening,
with the assistance of your porter, to strike the balance between the
entrances and exits of visitors; and, in order to obtain accurate
results, there is nothing to prevent your teaching him to keep a book
of visitors, in double entry.
If you have a garden, cultivate a taste for dogs, and always keep at
large one of these incorruptible guardians under your windows; you
will thus gain the respect of the Minotaur, especially if you accustom
your four-footed friend to take nothing substantial excepting from the
hand of your porter, so that hard-hearted celibates may not succeed in
poisoning him.
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