ce, or St. Vitus's dance, as it is popularly termed,
has been repeatedly cured by marriage. As a rule, painful menstruation,
which always arises from some defect or disease of the ovaries or
adjacent organs, is improved, and often completely removed, by
the same act. There are, as is well known, a whole series of
emotional disorders,--hysteria, and various kinds of mania and
hallucination,--which are almost exclusively confined to single persons,
and only occur in the married under exceptional circumstances. An
instance has lately been detailed in the medical journals by a Prussian
physician, of a case of undoubted hereditary insanity which was greatly
benefited--indeed temporarily cured--by a fortunate nuptial relation. Few
who have watched a large circle of lady acquaintances but will have
observed that many of them increased in flesh and improved in health when
they had been married some months. An English writer of distinction
accounts for these favourable results in a peculiar manner. Success, he
says, is always a tonic, and the best of tonics. Now, to women, marriage
is a success. It is their aim in social life; and this accomplished,
health and strength follow. We are not quite ready to subscribe to such a
sweeping assertion, but no doubt it is applicable in a limited number of
cases. Our own opinion is, that nature gave to each sex certain
functions, and that the whole system is in better health when all parts
and powers fulfil their destiny.

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 chi