he honeymoon and the rising of the Red-moon.

There is in life one principle more potent than life itself. It is a
movement whose celerity springs from an unknown motive power. Man is
no more acquainted with the secret of this revolution than the earth is
aware of that which causes her rotation. A certain something, which
I gladly call the current of life, bears along our choicest thoughts,
makes use of most people's will and carries us on in spite of ourselves.
Thus, a man of common-sense, who never fails to pay his bills, if he is
a merchant, a man who has been able to escape death, or what perhaps is
more trying, sickness, by the observation of a certain easy but daily
regimen, is completely and duly nailed up between the four planks of his
coffin, after having said every evening: "Dear me! to-morrow I will not
forget my pills!" How are we to explain this magic spell which rules all
the affairs of life? Do men submit to it from a want of energy? Men who
have the strongest wills are subject to it. Is it default of memory?
People who possess this faculty in the highest degree yield to its
fascination.

Every one can recognize the operation of this influence in the case of
his neighbor, and it is one of the things which exclude the majority of
husbands from the honeymoon. It is thus that the wise man, survivor of
all reefs and shoals, such as we have pointed out, sometimes falls into
the snares which he himself has set.

I have myself noticed that man deals with marriage and its dangers
in very much the same way that he deals with wigs; and perhaps the
following phases of thought concerning wigs may furnish a formula for
human life in general.

FIRST EPOCH.--Is it possible that I shall ever have white hair?

SECOND EPOCH.--In any case, if I have white hair, I shall never wear a
wig. Good Lord! what is more ugly than a wig?

One morning you hear a young voice, which love much oftener makes to
vibrate than lulls to silence, exclaiming:

"Well, I declare! You have a white hair!"

THIRD EPOCH.--Why not wear a well-made wig which people would not
notice? There is a certain merit in deceiving everybody; besides, a wig
keeps you warm, prevents taking cold, etc.

FOURTH EPOCH.--The wig is so skillfully put on that you deceive every
one who does not know you.

The wig takes up all your attention, and _amour-propre_ makes you every
morning as busy as the most skillful hairdresser.

FIFTH EPOCH.--The neglected wig. "G