shame to myself that my folly has lost me the right of resenting your ridicule of a friend.”

“Pray allow me,” said the stranger, approaching a step nearer, and laying his gloved hand on my sleeve. “One other favor I must ask of you. You have a young person here at Blithedale, of whom I have heard, — whom, perhaps, I have known, — and in whom, at all events, I take a peculiar interest.

She is one of those delicate, nervous young creatures, not uncommon in New England, and whom I suppose to have become what we find them by the gradual refining away of the physical system among your women. Some philosophers choose to glorify this habit of body by terming it spiritual; but, in my opinion, it is rather the effect of unwholesome food, bad air, lack of