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France, was attacked, defeated, and driven from his dominions.

He collected another army of Swiss and Italians, and encountered the foreign hosts once more on the battle-field. The conflict would have been decided in his favor, but the Swiss had been secretly bribed by the French, and in the heat of action withdrew. The Italians were panic-stricken and fled. Ludovico, deserted by all but one or two attendants, took the clothes from the dead body of a peasant, and sought to escape in this disguise. He almost accomplished his purpose, but at nightfall was recognized by a cavalryman, seized, and dragged to prison. Alone in the gloomy cell, the duke pondered the livelong, sleepless night on the past, with its glorious and misused opportunities, and on the blank and hopeless future. The next morning the gaoler found in the cell a wan and gray-haired man, instead of the raven-locked and handsome nobleman he had shut in the night before. In one night, grief and fear had done the work of years. His terrors were not without foundation, for those chains never left his limbs till they were struck off his corpse.

Such instances are by no means rare, and we could readily name many other characters distinguished in history, whose sufferings, proportionate to their powers and prospects, have prematurely, and in a very short time, blanched their locks.

It is of more interest, however, to inquire into the general causes which are at work in bringing about this unwelcome change. The fact is familiar that in the large majority of cases we find, on examining a head about becoming gray, that single hairs are gray throughout their whole length, while others retain their original color. We do not find a hair black at the extremity and white at the root, as we might ex'pect, nor do we find others passing through the intermediate hues between gray, and that natural to the person. What we do find is a single, long, silvery thread, winding conspicuous and ominous among the raven tresses.

This is because when a hair turns gray it loses its pigment promptly-in a few hours or a few days throughout its whole length-owing to absorption by the root, or some chemical or mechanical change in the hair itself.

There are some persons who turn gray very early without visible cause, and in some families premature grayness is hereditary. Sometimes a single lock of the hair, or one spot on the head, alters in color, while all the remainder is unchanged. To explain such vagaries is not easy.

Very respectable authorities say that when gray hair falls out, it does not grow again. This may be the rule, but we have known exceptions to it. A lady of our acquaintance lost all her hair, which was gray,

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during an illness. After her recovery a new growth appeared, thick and curly, but of the same silvery hue.

Whatever the cause, extent, or manner of the grayness may be, the practical question is, how to conceal it, if concealment is desired. There are some faces which appear more pleasing with silvery locks, and at a certain age (we will not venture to give figures) it is uncomely to simulate the tresses of youth, when the ravages of years are too plainly visible on the features and the form. In premature grayness no good reason can be offered against hiding the disfigurement.

Can the natural color be restored by diet or by drugs? Many writers and many charlatans aver that it can. The latter are ready to hand out some secret fluid "which is not a dye," the former speak of food rich in carbon and iron, tonic medicines, and such other chemical elements as analysis reveals in dark hair.

We believe that none of these means will with certainty arrest the tendency to grayness, and still less will they bring the color to that which is already blanched. The general experience is that grayness is not a consequence of physical debility, or of an insufficient diet. Nor can any external application materially darken the hair, except as it acts either as a paint or a dye. All claims to the contrary are of little value, and when vehemently urged, cause us to suspect the nostrum which puts them forth as unworthy of