I trust due tribute will be paid to the ingenuity of failing age, which has perfected this device for warding off its unwelcome tokens. The rationale of the plan is very simple. The plaster contracts the skin, and prevents its sinking into creases and lines. It also protects and softens the skin. I have heard of one oldish lady who wears these ornamental appendages all the time in the house when not receiving company, and covers parts of her face with a dough made of well-mumbled bread to keep her complexion fair. The heroism of this resistance to time must be applauded, but it is an open question whether the play is worth the candle. The beauty of age lies not in freshness like that of sixteen, but in clear and lofty expression, in the look of experience and not unkindly shrewdness, in the finish of self-repression, of calmness, trust, and sympathy. These things grow on a face as it loses freshness and roundness, just as the sky begins to show through thinning boughs. The greatest of blessings for some people would be to learn to accept themselves and their gifts. If they could stand apart from themselves a while to see their becoming points, much of their repining would be dropped. Every thing and every body is beautiful in its season. There is a wholesome plainness that accords with domestic life and natural surroundings, as the bark of trees relieves their green. The color of health, the gentleness and sweetness that come of a conquered self, are elements of beauty that make any face tolerable. How dear are the plain faces that have watched our childhood, with whom we have grown up so closely that feature and form have lost their significance, so that we really do not know whether they are homely or not, and see only the love or the humor that lives in their faces. In general, very ugly people are happily indifferent to their looks, and degrees of imperfection may always be lessened by judicious use of the arts of dress. A young and homely woman makes herself agreeable by the complete neatness of a very simple toilet. Let her eschew dresses of two colors, or of two shades even, though the latter are allowable, if the shadings are very soft. When the complexion is dull, there must be some warm or lively tinges of color in the costume, and vice versa. But it is easier to dress real figures than to generalize.