4. Take one and a half to two ounces Sulphate of Iron and mix it with two quarts of soft water. This is a mixture which any New York quack will charge you from three to five dollars for, and will pretend it is a great and wonderful secret. Another plan which the wife may adopt for the prevention of conception is as follows: Procure a fine sponge at a drug-store, and cut off a piece of it about the size of a walnut; then make a fine silk string by twisting together some threads of sewing silk; tie one end of the string to the piece of sponge; wet the sponge in a weak solution of sulphate of iron, or of any of the solutions before mentioned as fatal to the animalculæ of the Semen. Before connection, insert the piece of sponge far up into your person. You can place it entirely out of the way by the use of a smooth stick of the proper size and shape. The string will hang out, but will be no obstacle. After the act is over, you withdraw the sponge, and if you have a syringe, use that also. This method is pronounced by some physicians to be a sure one, and the only objection to it is that it is apt to mar the pleasure experienced by the wife. Some of our quack doctors charge five dollars for this information. It is true, they furnish a certain mysterious powder to make a mixture of in which to wet the sponge used; but the powder is nothing more than sulphate of iron, or some astringent similar to those named by us. Coverings for the Penis, which are used in Europe to avoid contracting sexual diseases from prostitutes, must necessarily prevent conception. With one of these coverings (which are now made beautifully with a preparation of India-rubber) a man may be certain that he will never impregnate his wife. But the enjoyment of the nuptial act is not so complete as a naked Penis affords, hence the covering, or sheath, is not very popular. The cost of the best article is about three dollars a dozen. Some men tie up the scrotum to prevent a discharge of Semen, and thus hope to avoid impregnating the female; but this method is exceedingly hurtful, as it forces the discharge into the bladder, from whence it passes off with the urine. Such a practice will in a short time so derange the procreative organs as to send all the Semen into the bladder as fast as it generates, and the effect on health will be a wasting away of vitality in the same manner as if the patient constantly practiced self-pollution. I have thus given the only safe methods of preventing conception that are known. The first one—the withdrawal—is an art to be acquired by the husband. It is a plan which every person of good breeding should adopt for its cleanliness alone, if for no other reason. Once habituated to this precaution while enjoying the nuptial bed, you will wonder how rational beings can pursue a different course. It is indeed a refinement of social intercourse—a triumph of mind which thus controls even the laws and instincts of our nature!