never forget the comical expression of dismay with which the suitor rolls his eyes and drops his jaw as he turns aside. I felt rather than saw the comprehensive look which accompanied his comment on my thinness, and that scene flashed across my inner vision. Odd, was it not? A sort of sympathetic after-comprehension. It was as if I, too, were having a hand passed across the flatness of my figure. "'Yes, I have got thin.' Silence. Had I been very ill? Yes, very! Was that why I was so pale? It was fearful,--not a tinge of warm color in my face; one would be afraid to touch me. I felt as if I were being toted up: item, so much color; item, so much flesh. Had I been worried? I had lost that buoyant childishness that was so attractive. Ah, yes, I had dwelt too much on a trouble I had. Did I sleep? Not much. That was foolish. I ought to eat plenty, too. I looked as if I didn't eat enough; my eyes and cheeks were hollowed out. Ah, yes, no doubt I did look older than in autumn! I was not contradicted. I would have told a little lie to spare a man's feelings. Men are perhaps more conscientious. "What else? I am rehearsing it all as best I can. Oh, my hands were altered; he thought they were not so small, eh? Might be my wrists were less round, that made a difference. Did it? They certainly were larger, and not so white. Did he kiss me? Oh, yes. You see I wanted to sift this thing thoroughly, to get clear into my head what ground I was standing on. So I let him. They were merely lip-kisses; his spirit did not come to mine, and I was simply analyzing them all the time. Did I not feel anything? Yes, I did,--deeply hurt; ah, I can't say how they hurt me! They lacked everything a kiss, as the expression of the strongest, best feeling of a man and woman, _can_ hold. How do I know? My dear woman, have you never dreamt, felt, had _intuitive experiences_? I have. I am not sure that I had not a keen sense of the ludicrous side of the whole affair; that one portion of my soul was not having a laugh at the other's expense. I do not quite know what I had been expecting. 'Tis true he had written me beautiful letters. You see he is too much of a word-artist to write anything else. "Treated me badly? No, I am not prepared to say that he did. I am glad he was too honest to hide his startled realization of the fact that autumn and spring are different seasons, and that one's feelings may undergo a change in a winter. I do not see why I should resent that. Why, it would be punishing him for having cared for me. To put it in his words: 'I came as a strangely lovely dream into his life.' Probably the whole mistake lay in that. He thought of me as a dream lady, with dainty hands; idealized me, and wrote to the dream creature. When I came back in the flesh, he realized that I was a prosaic fact, with less charming hands, a tendency to leanness, and coming crow's feet. His look of dismayed awakening was simply delicious.