14 SECOND NATURE. 



of Fifth Avenue, we still find that, whenever we 

 have got as far with his address as "Jeremiah 

 Tompkins, Esq.," the pen seems of itself to run 

 on into 37 East Fourteenth Street, and it is only 

 with an effort that we substitute in its place the 

 new address in the more dignified up-town district. 

 Everybody lias had abundant examples of the same 

 sort within the range of his own experience. We 

 change our banker, let us say ; but as soon as we 

 write on an envelope the words, " The Manager," 

 in a trice the name of the old bank writes itself 

 down against our will in the place of the new one. 

 We go away from home on a holiday; but at the 

 head of our letters we still tend to begin by dating 

 from the old familiar domestic address. At the 

 commencement of each new year, how hard we find 

 it to alter from the old date to the new, though 

 the practice has run but for a single twelvemonth ; 

 while every married lady must well remember 

 with what difficulty she altered her maiden signa- 

 ture to the one forced upon her by the not wholly 

 distasteful necessities of marriage. After one has 

 written {ill one's lifetime, up to date, "Very affec- 

 tionately yours, Ethel Smith," it must be with a 

 sudden pull-up of the i)en and hand that one 

 alters it at last by an effort of will into " Ethel 

 Montgomery." 



What is the rational and underlying cause of 

 this force of habit? Clearly, the nerves and brain 



