This impatience was a characteristi

This impatience was a characteristic of which he was well aware and that he never earnestly attempted to change. The day he proposed to Bee, she told him point-blank that he had acted impatiently while awaiting her reply to his marriage proposal. “Well, my characteristics have not changed any in that line,” he wrote.46 He had earlier promised to quit smoking and drinking, activities he apparently considered vices; he made no such promise concerning his tendency toward impatience. In fact, he commented, “my impatience, my unreasonableness, etc. do you [Bee] not think that you have a hard proposition ahead, to control those undesirable qualities. However one thing is sure— when you are with me the cause is removed so they are nonexistent.”47 Arnold’s belief in the quick and accurate decision was a result of confidence in his own knowledge and of his trust in the knowledge of others. For the most part, however, when Bee was around he kept his impatience in check.