The excitement of shows; gauds, glitter, pageants; the brief triumphs gained in fashionable tournaments, will not expel this foe of your higher and nobler life, but only veil, for brief seasons, his presence from your consciousness.

When these are past, and you retire into yourself, then comes back the pain, the languor, the excessive weariness.

Is it not so, Delia?
Is not this your sad experience ?" I paused.

Her eyes had fallen to the floor.

She sat very still, like one who was thinking deeply.
"The plodding housekeeper, whose picture you drew just now--humble, even mean in your regard though she be--sinks to peaceful sleep when her tasks are done, and rises refreshed at coming dawn.