culpable in the mothers--disastrous, fatal to the daughters. It is a
_disgrace_ to our people. The young women now coming on, will be as
nervous, as weak, as wretched, as their unhappy mothers--languishing
embodiments of diseases--mementos of doctors and pill-boxes,
dragging out life in air-tight rooms, religiously struggling to
perform their duties, and dying before they have half finished the
allotted term of life. They have no life--no true enjoyment of
life!"

"What a tirade, Julius! Any one would think you were a cross old
bachelor!"

"On the contrary, my dear Anne, it is because I am a young bachelor
and desire not to be a much older one, that I am so earnest on this
subject. I have been travelling now for two months in rail-cars and
steamers, and I could fill a medical journal with cases of young
women, married and single, whom I have met from town and country,
with every ill that flesh is heir to. I have been an involuntary
auditor of their charming little confidences of 'chronic headaches,'
nervous feelings,' 'weak-backs,' 'neuralgia,' and Heaven knows what
all!"

"Oh, Julius! Julius!"

"It is true, Anne. And their whole care is, gentle and simple, to
avoid the air; never to walk when they can ride; never to use cold
water when they can get warm; never to eat bread when they can get
cake, and so on, and so on, through the chapter. In the matter of
eating and drinking, and such little garnitures as smoking and
chewing, the men are worse. Fortunately, their occupations save most