16 THE FLORAL TELEGRAPH. 
painful to me, thus typically sha¬ 
dowed out. From that moment I 
made a vow to increase, a hundred¬ 
fold, my respect and my attentions 
to the whole sex. Ladies, that vow 
I have kept. 
I must observe, enpassant, that the 
nine Muses had been scandalously 
used. I impute it to the jealousy of 
that hoary destroyer, Time. The 
gatherer-in of generations has no 
greater enemy than these ladies. 
Whatever is saved from this insa¬ 
tiate glutton, is saved by them. Their 
opponent had taken them at a disad¬ 
vantage. He had fairly humbled 
them. They were rotten about the 
