Gregory says
Do you know why half the couples who find themselves situated as we are now behave horridly? It’s because they have nothing else to do, and no other way of entertaining each other. You don’t know what it is to be alone with a woman who has little beauty and less conversation. What is a man to do? She can’t talk interestingly; and if he talks that way himself she doesn’t understand him. He can’t look at her: if he does, he only finds out that she isn’t beautiful. Before the end of five minutes they are both hideously bored. There’s only one thing that can save the situation; and that’s what you call being horrid. With a beautiful, witty, kind woman, there’s no time for such follies. It’s so delightful to look at her, to listen to her voice, to hear all she has to say, that nothing else happens. That is why the woman who is supposed to have a thousand lovers seldom has one; whilst the stupid, graceless animals of women have dozens.