ior nerve of women in all matters connected with love, from the
casting of the first sheep's-eye down to the end of the honeymoon, is
too well acknowledged to need comment. Nor is the example a fair one to
cite in the present instance, the positions not being equally balanced.
Love is woman's business, and in "business" we all lay aside our natural
weaknesses--the shyest man I ever knew was a photographic tout.

ON BABIES.

Oh, yes, I do--I know a lot about 'em. I was one myself once, though not
long--not so long as my clothes. They were very long, I recollect, and
always in my way when I wanted to kick. Why do babies have such yards of
unnecessary clothing? It is not a riddle. I really want to know. I never
could understand it. Is it that the parents are ashamed of the size of
the child and wish to make believe that it is longer than it actually
is? I asked a nurse once why it was. She said:

"Lor', sir, they always have long clothes, bless their little hearts."

And when I explained that her answer, although doing credit to her
feelings, hardly disposed of my difficulty, she replied:

"Lor', sir, you wouldn't have 'em in short clothes, poor little dears?"
And she said it in a tone that seemed to imply I had suggested some
unmanly outrage.

Since than I have felt shy at making inquiries on the subject, and
the reason--if reason there be--is still a mystery to me. But indeed,
putting them in any clothes at all seems absurd to my mind. Goodness
knows there is enough of dressing and undressing to be gone through
in life without beginning it before we need; and one would think that
people who live in bed might at all events be spared the torture. Why
wake the poor little wretches up in the morning to take one lot of
clothes off, fix another lot on, and put them to bed again, and then
at night haul them out once more, merely to change everything back?
And when all is done, what difference is there, I should like to know,
between a baby's night-shirt and the thing it wears in the day-time?

Very likely, however, I am only making myself ridiculous--I often do,
so I am informed--and I will therefore say no more upon this matter
of clothes, except only that it would be of great convenience if some
fashion were adopted enabling you to tell a boy from a girl.

At present it is most awkward. Neither hair, dress, nor conversation
affords the slightest clew, and you are left to guess. By some
mysterious law of nature y