One day just before he came I had read two statements in the Bible that had amused me: “A horse is a vain thing for safety,” and, “The arms of the wicked shall be broken.” He laughed heartily when I told him what I had found, and leaning over my chair as he looked on the page, asked with engaging stammer, “Is th-that really in the B-bible, Genie?” That was told with unction to Annette when she came after school--ostensibly to keep me informed about the lessons, but chiefly to get reports of the daily visits. She envied me then, but her time of rejoicing came later when he treated her for jaundice; only, she complained, jaundice wasn’t as interesting as a broken arm--one “looked such a fright”; and, if the truth must be told, by the time her jaundice developed we had both become somewhat disenchanted. Our unfeeling idol remained in ignorance of our adoration, and actually wooed and married an attractive young woman of his own age! We tortured ourselves with watching the progress of this courtship, and tried hard to pose as blighted beings during the week of his wedding. At the fatal hour that gave him to another, we agreed to withdraw from the gaze of the cold world and battle with our sorrow alone. It fell to me to pick Grandma’s raspberries at that hour; but the hands could perform their task though the heart was wrung with grief. The seclusion of the berry-patch was welcome; there would I wrestle with this cup. I thought of Annette and hoped she was as secluded as I, and wondered if her heart was as heavy. Picking the berries, I recited aloud “The Lonely One” (the most melancholy poem I could think of) and tried to picture the long years of desolation ahead of me. But my recollection is that, try as I would, I could not induce the requisite degree of misery. And not long after, Annette and I confessed to each other, rather guiltily, that for some time our feelings had not been as heartfelt as we had led each other to suppose. Thus ended our romance about “Apollo,” as we named him in our diaries. It must have been three years before I left school that I conceived the idea of studying medicine; it was during the period when I was so religiously inclined. I had been to a Sunday-school excursion on Seneca Lake that day when the idea came to me. There I had heard much talk of a girl in our class who, having received a severe fall some months before, and whom we had considered hopelessly injured, was now improving surprisingly under the care of a woman physician from a distant town. Her parents were too poor to procure these services, but an aunt had recently sent for the physician; and the girl’s recovery then seemed assured. All this I heard without apparently hearing, giving it scant heed in the hustle and gayety of our lake picnic. An old negress on the boat had told our fortunes that day, predicting beaux and happy or unhappy marriages for all the girls but me. When someone asked, “Isn’t _she_ going to marry?” she replied: