"That and getting married are the sole objects of their existence," said Palestrina. 

 "It is very odd," I said, "that women so devoid of what might be called sentiment are yet so bent upon this very thing." 

 "Eliza told me to-day," said Palestrina, "that as Kate has not mentioned one single man in her letters home, they cannot help thinking that there is something in it." 

 The Jamiesons have the same vigorous, energetic ideas about matrimony that they have about everything else, and almost their sole grievance, naïvely expressed, is that Maud, "who gets them all"—meaning, I believe, offers of marriage—is the only one of the family who is unable to make up her mind clearly on this momentous question. 

 "We should not mind," say the conclave of sisters during one of the numerous family discussions on this subject, "even if she does get all the admirers—for of course she is the pretty one—if only she would accept one of them. But she always gets undecided and silly as soon as they come to the point." 

 It should be observed in passing that the different stages of development in love affairs are shrewdly noted and commented upon by the Jamiesons. The first evidence of a man's preference is that he "is struck;" and the second, when he begins to visit at the house, is known as "hovering."  An inquiry after Maud's health will sometimes elicit the unexpected reply that another admirer is hovering at present. The third stage is reached when the lover is said to be "dangling;" and the final triumph, when Maud has received a proposal, is noted as having "come to the point." 

 If Maud's triumphs are watched with small sighs of envy by her sisters, they are a source of nothing but gratification to them to retail to the outside world. There is a strict account kept of Maud's "conquests" in the letters sent to relatives, and the evening's post will sometimes contain the startling announcement that Maud has had a fourth in one year. 

 "Of course, you know how fond we all are of each other," said Eliza Jamieson to me one day with one of those unexpected confidences which the effeminacy of sickness seems to warrant, if not actually to invite, "but we can't help thinking that, humanly speaking, we should all have a better chance if only Maud would marry. No one would wish her to marry without love, but we fear she is looking for perfection, and that she will never get; and it was really absurd of her to be so upset when 

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