shall entirely absorb her strength. Without setting
your wife to work the crank of a machine, there are a thousand ways of
tiring her out under the load of constant work.

In leaving it to you to find means for carrying out our design--and
these means vary with circumstances--we would point out that dancing
is one of the very best abysses in which love may bury itself. This
point having been very well treated by a contemporary, we will give
him here an opportunity of speaking his mind:

"The poor victim who is the admiration of an enchanted audience
pays dear for her success. What result can possibly follow on
exertions so ill-proportioned to the resources of the delicate
sex? The muscles of the body, disproportionately wearied, are
forced to their full power of exertion. The nervous forces,
intended to feed the fire of passions, and the labor of the brain,
are diverted from their course. The failure of desire, the wish
for rest, the exclusive craving for substantial food, all point to
a nature impoverished, more anxious to recruit than to enjoy.
Moreover, a denizen of the side scenes said to me one day,
'Whoever has lived with dancers has lived with sheep; for in their
exhaustion they can think of nothing but strong food.' Believe me,
then, the love which a ballet girl inspires is very delusive; in
her we find, under an appearance of an artificial springtime, a
soil which is cold as well as greedy, and senses which are utterly
dulled. The Calabrian doctors prescribed the dance as a remedy for
the hysteric affections which are common among the women of their
country; and the Arabs use a somewhat similar recipe for the
highbred mares, whose too lively temperament hinders their
fecundity. 'Dull as a dancer' is a familiar proverb at the
theatre. In fact, the best brains of Europe are convinced that
dancing brings with it a result eminently cooling.

"In support of this it may be necessary to add other observations.
The life of shepherds gives birth to irregular loves. The morals
of weavers were horribly decried in Greece. The Italians have
given birth to a proverb concerning the lubricity of lame women.
The Spanish, in whose veins are found many mixtures of African
incontinence, have expressed their sentiments in a maxim which is
familiar with them: _Muger y gallina pierna quebrantada_ [it is
good that a woman and a hen have one broken leg]. The profound
sa