reading it, not having been able at the time to procure one in
infidel Paris, those who take the scientific course of getting the
facts first shake their heads despondingly. It is true that parents
discover diversities in their children. Some are sweeter-tempered
than others, and seem pointed horizontally, if not heavenward,
in their natures. Many bid fair to stand high, measured by earthly
standards. But the approving world can know nothing of the evil
thoughts that haunt the heart.

What mother has not been almost appalled as she has seen the face
of her still infant child inflamed with rage and the passionate
desire for revenge? The chubby hand is not always raised to caress,
but too often to strike. As mind and heart develop, darker and meaner
traits unfold with every natural grace. There is a canker-worm in
the bud, and unless it is taken out, there never can be a perfect
flower.

But Mr. and Mrs. Marsden thought of none of these things. The mother
received her estimate of life, and her duty, from current opinion
on the avenue. She complacently felicitated herself that she kept
up with the changing mode quite as well as most women of wealth
and fashion, if not better. She managed so well that she excited
the admiration of some, and the envy of more; and so was content.
As for Mr. Marsden, what with his business, his newspaper, whist,
and an occasional evening at the club or some entertainment or public
meeting that he could not escape, his life was full and running
over. He never had time to give a thought to the fine theories about
his children, nor to the rather contradictory facts often reported
from the nursery. But as year after year he paid the enormous and
increasing bills for nurses, gouvernantes, Italian music masters,