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One of the best bookkeepers I ever knew was so perfectly concentrated while at his work that nothing ever disturbed him; but he was one of the most fretful and nervous of men at home and in society. A merchant of my acquaintance, most genial and concentrated upon business in his store, was cross and fickle at home. A professor among my friends, is completely self-possessed and absorbed in his study and class, but is a most timid and nervous man elsewhere. I have a friend so concentrated in his base-ball game that he knows no pain when injured, but possesses so little endurance at other times that a cut on his finger while at his work unnerves him. I knew a surgeon most cool and impassive when at the operating --- table, that would walk the floor all night before an important operation. I know of actors so concentrated upon their part that they do not remember anything that has transpired during the play, but who are so nervous at other times that they break down in insomnia. I had a friend, a most successful orator, so concentrated when talking that he would not sense his body, who was in his home and office the most restless and sensitive of men. I know a woman who is so fretful and fickle with her children that she spoils them, but who will play croquet with perfect abandon, forgetting everything.

This is the case with many gamesters at cards, and habitudes of race --- courses. These are all examples of concentration under necessity or habit. This condition is a dangerous one for health and happiness, because uncontrolled. All excitement is concentration, where the person has completely lost self-control. For this reason Emerson says, "When you become interested in