"I do believe, Julius, you are interested in Mary Marvel!"

"I am. I was always curious as to the different modes of suicide
people adopt. Has she any occupation--any pleasure?"

"Oh, yes; she reads for ever, and studies; she is studying German
now."

"Poor Mary!"

"What in the world makes you pity Mary, Julius?"

"Because, Anne, she hag been deprived of nature's best
gift--defrauded of her inheritance: a sound constitution from
temperate, active parents. One may have all the gifts, graces,
charms, accomplishments, under Heaven, and, if they have not health,
of what use or enjoyment are they? If that little, frail body of
Mary Marvel's contained all that I have enumerated, it would be just
the reverse of Pandora's box--having every good, but one curse that
infected all."

"Dear Julius, I cannot bear to hear you talk so of Mary. I expected
you would like her so much. I--I--hoped--. She is so pretty, so
Lovely--she is fit for Heaven."

"She may be, Anne,--I do not doubt it; but she is very unfit for
earth. What has her good, devoted, sensible, well-informed mother
been about? If Mary had been taught the laws of health, and obeyed
them, it would have been worth infinitely more to her than all she
has got at your famous boarding-school, Ignorance of these laws is