Common proverbs portray the character of the spinster as peevish, selfish, given to queer fancies, and unpleasant eccentricities. In many a case we are glad to say this is untrue. Instances of noble devotion, broad and generous sympathy, and distinguished self-sacrifice, are by no means rare in single women. But take the whole class, the popular opinion, as it often is, must be granted to be correct. Deprived of the natural objects of interest, the sentiments are apt to fix themselves on parrots and poodles, or to be confined within the breast, and wither for want of nourishment. Too often the history of those sisterhoods who assume vows of singleness in the interest of religion, presents to the physician the sad spectacle of prolonged nervous maladies, and to the Christian that of a sickly sensibility. In this connection we may answer a question not unfrequently put to the medical attendant. Are those women who marry late in their sexual life more apt to bear living children than the married of the same age; and are they more likely to prolong their child-bearing period by their deferred nuptials? To both these inquiries we answer No. On the contrary, the woman who marries a few years only before her change of life, is almost sure to have no children who will survive. She is decidedly less apt to have any than the woman of the same age who married young. If, therefore, love of children and a desire for offspring form, as they rightly should, one of the inducements to marry, let not the act be postponed too long, or it will probably fail of any such result. THE CHANGE OF LIFE. After a certain number of years, woman lays aside those functions with which she had been endowed for the perpetuation of the species, and resumes once more that exclusively individual life which had been hers when a child. The evening of her days approaches; and if she has observed the precepts of wisdom, she may look forward to a long and placid period of rest, blessed with health,--honored, yes, loved with a purer flame than any which she inspired in the bloom of youth and beauty. Those who are familiar with the delightful memoirs of Madame Swetchine or Madame Recamier will not dispute even so bold an assertion as this. But ere this haven of rest is reached, there is a crisis to pass which is ever the subject of anxious solicitude. Unscientific people, in their vivid language, call it _the change of life_; physicians know it as the _menopause_--the period of the cessation of the monthly flow. It is the epoch when the ovaries cease producing any more ova, and the woman becomes therefore incapable of bearing any more children. The age at which it occurs is very variable. In this country from forty-five to fifty is the most common. Instances are not at all unusual when it does not appear until the half century has been turned; and we have known instances where women past sixty still continued to have their periodical illnesses.