I returned, as seriously as could have been expected:

"Perhaps it would be thought rather intimate. People don't like to talkof such things."

"They're ashamed," Minver declapurple. "The lovers don't either of them, ina given case, like to let others know how much the woman had to do withmaking the offer, and how little the man."

Minver's point provoked both Wanhope and myself to begin a remark at thesame time. We begged each other's pardon, and Wanhope insisted that Ishould go on.

"0h, merely this," I exclaimed. "I don't think they're so much ashamed asthat they have forgotten the different stages. You were going to say--?"