She is silly and romantic, and must dream of some one. It is a pity it should be encouraged by familiarity. ---- has no feeling for them beyond pity and friendship, but it is not necessary he should love a woman to make her dangerous to him. As far as I can see your lives extend, ---- will love you, and you will retain your influence over him if you _choose_ to do so. But it is in your own hands what you make of him. You must not judge his nature by your own. You are shutting yourself up too much. You should be surrounded by a circle of men, so that you might not draw influence from ---- alone. You should go out more, and associate with clever men, and hear what they have to say to you. You must not keep so entirely with ----. It is bad for both of you. You are making too great a demand upon his spiritual powers, and you will exhaust them too soon. A woman cannot draw spiritual life from women only. She must take it from men. There is another acquaintance I must warn you against ----; a widow, fair hair, light eyes, not clever, but cunning. She has but one purpose in visiting you. She would like to stand in your shoes. She would not hesitate to usurp your rights. Be civil to her if you will, but do not encourage her visits. It were best if she passed out of your lives altogether. She can never bring you any good luck. She may be the cause of much annoyance yet. ---- should have work, active and constant, or his health will fail, living in idleness, spiritually and bodily. You tell him too often that you love him. Let him feel there is always a higher height to gain, a lower depth to fall to, in your esteem. He is not the only man in the world. Why should you deceive him by saying so? You are much to blame." (Considering that Mr. Fletcher had never seen, or, as far as I knew, heard of the persons he mentioned in this tirade, it becomes a matter of speculation where or from whom he gathered this keen insight to their character and personalities, every word of which I can vouch for as being strictly true.)