so far been able to execute, in the hope that later he may have leisure to co-ordinate them and to arrange them in a complete system.  If he has been so far kept back in the accomplishment of a task of supreme national importance, he believes, he may say, without incurring the charge of vanity, that he has here indicated the natural division of those symptoms.  They are necessarily of two kinds:  the unicorns and the bicorns.  The unicorn Minotaur is the least mischievous.  The two culprits confine themselves to a platonic love, in which their passion, at least, leaves no visible traces among posterity; while the bicorn Minotaur is unhappiness with all its fruits.

We have marked with an asterisk the symptoms which seem to concern the latter kind.

MINOTAURIC OBSERVATIONS.

I.

When, after remaining a long time aloof from her husband, a woman makes overtures of a very marked character in order to attract his love, she acts in accordance with the axiom of maritime law, which says:  _The flag protects the cargo_.

II.

A woman is at a ball, one of her friends comes up to her and says: 

“Your husband has much wit.”

“You find it so?”

III.

Your wife discovers that it is time to send your boy to a boarding school, with whom, a little time ago, she was never going to part.

IV.

In Lord Abergavenny’s suit for divorce, the _valet de chambre_ deposed that “the countess had such a detestation of all that belonged to my lord that he had very often seen her burning the scraps of paper which he had touched in her room.”

V.

If an indolent woman becomes energetic, if a woman who formerly hated study learns a foreign language; in short, every appearance of a complete change in character is a decisive symptom.

VI.

The woman who is happy in her affections does not go much into the world.

VII.

The woman who has a lover becomes very indulgent in judging others.

VIII.

A husband gives to his wife a hundred crowns a month for dress; and, taking everything into account, she spends at least five hundred francs without being a sou in debt; the husband is robbed every night with a high hand by escalade, but without burglarious breaking in.

IX.

A married couple slept in the same bed; madame was always sick.  Now they sleep apart, she has no more headache, and her health becomes more brilliant than ever; an alarming symptom!

X.

A woman who was a sloven suddenly develops extreme nicety in her attire.  There is a Minotaur at hand!

XI.

“Ah! my dear, I know no greater torment than not to be understood.”

“Yes, my dear, but when one is—­”

“Oh, that scarcely ever happens.”

“I agree with you that it very seldom does.  Ah! it is great happiness, but there are not two people in the world who are able to understand you.”