No matter what the ignorant or the envious may say, there is nothing really unsocial in a moderate indulgence in the art of auto-comradeship. A few weeks of it bring you back a fresher, keener appreciator of your other friends and of humanity in general than you were before setting forth. In the continuous performance of the psalm of life such contrasts as this of solos and choruses have a reciprocal advantage. But auto-comradeship must not be overdone, as it was overdone by the medieval monks. Its delights are too delicious, its particular vintage of the wine of experience too rich, for long-continued consumption. Consecutive thought, though it is one of man’s greatest pleasures, is at the same time almost the most arduous labor that he can perform. And after a long spell of it, both the Auto-comrade and his companion become exhausted and, perforce, less comradely. Besides the incidental exhaustion, there is another reason why this beatific association must have its time-limit; for, unfortunately, one’s Auto-comrade is always of the same sex as oneself, and in youth, at least, if the presence of the complementary part of creation is long denied, there comes a time when this denial surges higher and higher in subconsciousness, then breaks into consciousness, and keeps on surging until it deluges all the tranquillities, zests, surprises, and excitements of auto-comradeship, and makes them of no effect. This is, perhaps, a wise provision for the salvation of the human digestion. For, otherwise, many a man, having tasted of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of auto-comradeship, might thereupon be tempted to retire to his hermit’s den hard by and endeavor to sustain himself for life on apple-sauce. Most of us, however, long before such extremes have been reached, are sure to rush back to our kind for the simple reason that we are enjoying auto-comradeship so much that we want some one else to enjoy it with. THE WHITE LINEN NURSE HOW RAE MALGREGOR UNDERTOOK GENERAL HEARTWORK FOR A FAMILY OF TWO BY ELEANOR HALLOWELL ABBOTT Author of “Molly Make-Believe,” etc. IN THREE PARTS: PART THREE WITH PICTURES BY HERMAN PFEIFER SYNOPSIS OF PRECEDING INSTALMENTS On the day of her graduation from the training-school, the White Linen Nurse was overcome by hysteria. For weeks she had been working too hard, and two or three cases with which she had been connected having gone wrong, she had racked herself with an absurd sense of responsibility. Now, in her distracted state, the visible sign of her self-contempt was the perfectly controlled expression of her trained-nurse face.