Perhaps to common observation he is a gentleman, and you hear of his liasons in a whisper. Alas! for the wives of these gay cavaliers. They lead a lonely life, since he spends the best of himself--his suave manners and good nature--in fact, _all_ of himself elsewhere. Suddenly and all unexpectedly you hear that this attractive man, not forty-five, is sinking down with some insidious disease. It is called neuralgia in the head, or paralysis, and the doctor has the promise of a long job. It is, in fact, softening of the brain, caused by excessive passional excitement and the undue drain on his vital forces. He may live years, his digestive organs holding out better, because having drifted into idiocy there is no longer any wear and tear of the mind. This man has been “successful” with women, and this is the finale. THE FATHER’S INFLUENCE THROUGH THE WIFE. Mr. Z., a man of thirty-five, of a refined, intellectual, but rather cold nature, married his ward, an amiable, immature girl of fifteen. Her attraction for him lay in her youthful affection and her healthy, handsome, physical characteristics. She had in her the “makings” of a thoughtful, self-reliant woman; but development in natural order was arrested by her being placed in so false a position--a wife at scarcely fifteen. Very soon after the marriage she found herself pregnant. Meanwhile, Mr. Z. for love of her and for the sake of companionship, earnestly endeavored to awaken in her some intellectual tastes. He read to her, explaining and illustrating as he went along, many of the standard English poets and essayists. She listened, received, and grew _en rapport_ with him. Under these favorable auspices their first child was born. She was the child of the father, and wore his features, toned to greater delicacy of outline and purer colors. Her mind as she grew to womanhood was of a quite superior order, but wanted the breadth and generosity which more warmth in the father, and greater ripeness in the mother, would have secured to her. This infant once in the mother’s arms there could be no further leisure for literary or poetic culture. And as it was not possible for intellectual habits to be formed in the short space of twelve months, the young girl naturally slid back to her former plane of life. This was the more inevitable as their pecuniary circumstances made it necessary for Mrs. Z. to take sole charge of her little one. Two years from this time another child was born to them--a girl also; but in whom Mrs. Z.’s mental calibre was represented, while her fine physical traits were omitted.