us,--the very world seemed not the same world after as before. She had
given us a real gift; no criticism could take it away. The hands might
be sinful, but the box they broke contained an exceeding precious
ointment.

At a later day we saw these things rather differently. The electric
intoxication over, which book or being gives but once to the same
person, its elements were viewed with some distrust. Passing from ideal
to real life, as all pass, who live on, we shook our heads over the
books, sighed, ceased to read them. Grown mothers ourselves, we quietly
removed them as far as possible from the young hands about us, and would
rather have deprived them of the noble French language altogether than
have allowed it to bring them such lessons as Jacques and Valentine.
Yet we retain the old love for her; the world of literature still seems
brighter for her footsteps; and should we live to learn her death, tears
must follow it, and the sense of void left by the loss of a true friend,
noble and loyal-hearted, if mistaken. With this confession of sympathy
with the woman, we begin the critical consideration of the memoirs of
herself she has given to the world.

These memoirs begin at the earliest possible period, including the lives
of her parents and grandparents. The latter were illustrious on
one side, obscure on the other. She tells us that by her paternal
grandmother she was allied to the kings of France, and by her maternal
grandfather to the lowest of the people. The grandmother in question
was the natural daughter of the famous Maréchal de Saxe, recognized and
educated, but finally left with slender resources, and married to M.
Dupin de Francueil, an accomplished person of good family and fortune,
greatly her senior. To him she bore one child, a son named Maurice,
after the great soldier. As might have been expected, her widowhood was