efficacy when allowed free play; and perhaps the time may come when the worst cases shall deem it a plain duty to curse no future generations with the _damnosa hereditas_, which has caused such bitter wretchedness to themselves."[2] The second consideration is the acknowledged influence of beauty. "When one sees a god-like countenance," said Socrates to Phaedrus, "or some bodily form that represents beauty, he reverences it as a god, and would sacrifice to it." From the days of Plato till now, all have felt the power of woman's beauty, and been more than willing to sacrifice to it. The proper, not exclusive search for it is a legitimate inspiration. The way for a girl to obtain her portion of this radiant halo is by the symmetrical development of every part of her organization, muscle, ovary, stomach and nerve, and by a physiological management of every function that correlates every organ; not by neglecting or trying to stifle or abort any of the vital and integral parts of her structure, and supplying the deficiency by invoking the aid of the milliner's stuffing, the colorist's pencil, the druggist's compounds, the doctor's pelvic supporter, and the surgeon's spinal brace. When travelling in the East, some years ago, it was my fortune to be summoned as a physician into a harem. With curious and not unwilling step I obeyed the summons. While examining the patient, nearly a dozen Syrian girls--a grave Turk's wifely crowd, a result and illustration of Mohammedan female education--pressed around the divan with eyes and ears intent to see and hear a Western Hakim's medical examination. As I looked upon their well-developed forms, their brown skins, rich with the blood and sun of the East, and their unintelligent, sensuous faces, I thought that if it were possible to marry the Oriental care of woman's organization to the Western liberty and culture of her brain, there would be a new birth and loftier type of womanly grace and force. FOOTNOTES: [1] Woman's Wrongs, p. 59. [2] Enigmas of Life, p. 34. PART II. CHIEFLY PHYSIOLOGICAL. "She girdeth her loins with strength."--SOLOMON. Before describing the special forms of ill that exist among our American, certainly among our New-England girls and women, and that are often caused and fostered by our methods of education and social customs, it is important to refer in considerable detail to a few physiological matters. Physiology serves to disclose the cause, and explain the _modus operandi_, of these ills, and offers the only rational clew to their prevention and relief. The order in which the physiological data are presented that bear upon this discussion is not essential; their relation to the subject matter of it will be obvious as we proceed.