cause of a curse that
seemed to be hanging over her. Twice, following an irresistible impulse,
she had left her husband with another man for whom she had no particular
affection. It was a kind of recurrent madness which she did not
understand except that _she was positive that it had something to do
with the phases of the moon_. During about ten days of the month when
the moon was "dark," she was perfectly normal, but when a new moon
appeared she was conscious of a vague uneasiness that increased and
finally became acute when the moon was full, this being her time of
peril.

Venus in conjunction with Mars, Seraphine says, brings love at first
sight, but in evil aspect to Mars it makes one liable to sex-excesses.

She says that a good Neptune in the 5th house, the house of Romance, or
in the 7th house, the house of Marriage, brings an ideal and spiritual
attachment; but in evil aspect in either of these houses it brings an
immoral relationship or a marriage to one who is morally or physically
deformed. This was the condition in my own horoscope and certainly poor
Julian was deformed morally.

What a strange and fascinating light all this throws upon human
behavior! How it clears up mysterious infatuations and explains
incredible follies! Seraphine knows a woman of fifty--she is a
grandmother and a most estimable person--who has always had and still
has this power of attracting men violently to her. On one occasion this
woman was in a railway station in New York, waiting for her son, when a
fine looking man approached her and, lifting his hat, asked if she could
direct him to the train that would soon leave for Chicago. She told him
in her well-bred way, and he left her; but a few minutes later he
returned and said with intense feeling that he had never believed in
love at first sight, but now he did. He was compelled to believe in it
now.

When she drew back he told her that he was a widower, a man of means,
living in the West, that he could give her the best references and--the
point was that his infatuation for her was so great that he begged her
to consider whether she would be willing to marry him. He would do
everything in his power to make her happy, but declared that he could
not and would not try to live without her another day.

Knowing her horoscope the woman did not get angry at this presumption,
but gently declined the offer, and begged the man to leave her. He bowed
and withdrew, but came back once aga