[Illustration: G]Gentle woman!--Beautiful enigma!--whose magnetic glances
and countless charms subdue man's sterner nature--to you I dedicate the
following pages. The subject on which I am about to treat is the gravest,
the lightest, the most decided, the most undefined, the most earthly, the
most spiritual, the saddest, and the gayest, the most individual, and at
the same time the most universal you can imagine. To you, ladies, I
address myself. You who form the keys on which the eternal and infinite
gamut of love has been run from creation's first hour till the present
moment--tell me how I may best touch the chords of your hearts? Come
around me, ye earthly divinities of every age, rank, and imaginable
variety! Buds of blushing sixteen, full-blown roses of thirty, haughty
court dames, and smiling city beauties, come like delicious phantoms, and
fill my mind with images graceful as your own forms, and melting as your
own hearts! Thanks, gentle spirits! ye have heard my call, and now,
inspired by you, I seize my pen, and give to my paper the thoughts which
crowd upon my mind.

WHAT IS LOVE?

It is easier to answer this question by a thousand instances, than by one
definition, which can comprehend them all. What is Love? It is anything
you please. It is a prism, through which the eye beholds the same object
in various colours; it is a heaven of bliss, or a hell of torture; a
thirst of the heart--an appetite which we spiritualize; a pure expansion
of the soul, but which sooner or later becomes metamorphosed into an
animal passion--a diamond statue with feet of clay. It is a dream--a
delirium, a desire for danger, and a hope of conquest; it is that which
everyone abjures, and everyone covets; it is the end, the great end, and
the only end of life. Love, in short, is a tyrannical influence which none
can escape; and however metaphysicians may define the passion, it appears
to me that it is wholly dependent on the mysterious

[Illustration: LAWS OF ATTRACTION.]

A FEW WORDS ABOUT YOUNG LADIES.

A young lady, I mean one who has but recently thrown aside her dolls, is a
bashful blushing little puppet, who only acts, speaks, and moves as mama
directs. She is a statue of flesh and blood, not yet animated by the
Promethean fire--a chrysalis, which may one day become a beautiful
butterfly, fluttering on silken wing amidst a crowd of adorers; but she is
yet only a chrysalis, pale and cold, and wrapped up in a thousand
c