asks to live without breathing for many years!

"The ancient Stoics taught that the nearest approach to apathy was the
perfection of their doctrine. They prudently rested in utter
indifference; they did not attempt to go beyond it; they did not claim
absolute denial of all suffering; still less did they enjoin to persist
and rejoice in it, even to the 'dividing asunder of soul and body.' In
this, too, you will perceive the tight-laced lady taking a flight beyond
the sublime philosopher. She will not admit that she feels the slightest
inconvenience. Though she has fairly won laurels to which no Stoic dared
aspire, yet she studiously disclaims the distinction which she faced
death to earn--yea, denies that she has either part of lot in the
matter; surpassing in modesty, as well as in desert, all that antiquity
can boast or history record."

We quote the following from Miss Sedgwick: "One word as to these small
waists: Symmetry is essential to beauty of form. A waist
disproportionately small is a deformity to an instructed eye. Women must
have received their notions of small waists from ignorant dress-makers.
If young ladies could hear the remarks made on these small waists by men
generally, and especially men of taste, they would never again show
themselves till they had loosened their corset-laces and enlarged their
belts."




LETTER-WRITING.