There is something queer about Nellie--very queer. It is not only that she is different from my little sister--that's natural; but she is different from any woman of forty-eight I ever saw--from any woman of any age I ever saw. In the first place, she doesn't look _old_--not at all. Women of forty, in our region, were _old women_, and Nellie's near fifty! Then she isn't--what shall I call it--dependent; not the least in the world. As soon as I became really conscious, and strong enough to be of any use, and began to offer her those little services and attentions due to a woman, I noticed this difference. She is brisk, firm, assured--not unpleasantly so; I don't mean a thing of that sort; but somehow like--almost like a man! No, I certainly don't mean that. She is not in the least mannish, nor in the least self-assertive; but she takes things so easily--as if she owned them. * * * * * * I suppose it will be some time before my head is absolutely clear and strong as it used to be. I tire rather easily. Nellie is very reassuring about it. She says it will take about a year to re-establish connections and renew mental processes. She advises me to read and talk only a little every day, to sleep all I can, and not to worry. "You'll be all right soon, my dear," she says, "and plenty of life before you. You seem to have led a very healthy out-door life. You're really well and strong--and as good-looking as ever." At least she hasn't forgotten that woman's chief duty is to please. "And the world is a much better place to have in than it was," she assured me. "Things will surprise you, of course--things I have gotten used to and shall forget to tell you about. But the changes are all good ones, and you'll soon get--acclimated. You're young yet." That's where Nellie slips up. She cannot help having me in mind as the brave young brother she knew. She forgets that I am an old man now. Finally I told her that. "No, John Robertson," she says, "that's where you are utterly wrong. Of course, you don't know what we're doing about age--how differently we feel. As a matter of physiology we find that about one hundred and fifty ought to be our natural limit; and that with proper conditions we can easily get to be a hundred now. Ever so many do." "I don't want to be a hundred," I protested. "I saw a man of ninety-eight once, and never want to be one." "It's not like that now," she said. "I mean we live to be a hundred and enjoy life still--'keep our faculties,' as they used to put it. Why, the ship's doctor here is eighty-seven." This surprised me a good deal. I had talked a little with this man, and had thought him about sixty. "Then a man of a hundred, according to your story, would look like--like----" "Like Grandpa Ely," she offered. I remembered my mother's father--a tall, straight, hale old man of seventy-five. He had a clear eye, a firm step, a rosy color in his face. Well, that wasn't so bad a prospect.