laughing grace played round her mouth, and her countenance quickly
discovered all the various emotions of her soul. The dark auburn hair,
which curled in beautiful profusion in her neck, gave a finishing
charm to her appearance.

Thus lovely, and thus veiled in obscurity, were the daughters of the
noble Mazzini. But they were happy, for they knew not enough of the
world seriously to regret the want of its enjoyments, though Julia
would sometimes sigh for the airy image which her fancies painted, and
a painful curiosity would arise concerning the busy scenes from which
she was excluded. A return to her customary amusements, however, would
chase the ideal image from her mind, and restore her usual happy
complacency. Books, music, and painting, divided the hours of her
leisure, and many beautiful summer-evenings were spent in the
pavilion, where the refined conversation of madame, the poetry of
Tasso, the lute of Julia, and the friendship of Emilia, combined to
form a species of happiness, such as elevated and highly susceptible
minds are alone capable of receiving or communicating. Madame
understood and practised all the graces of conversation, and her young
pupils perceived its value, and caught the spirit of its character.

Conversation may be divided into two classes--the familiar and the
sentimental. It is the province of the familiar, to diffuse
cheerfulness and ease--to open the heart of man to man, and to beam a
temperate sunshine upon the mind.--Nature and art must conspire to
render us susceptible of the charms, and to qualify us for the
practice of the second class of conversation, here termed sentimental,
and in which Madame de Menon particularly excelled. To good sense,
lively feeling, and natural delicacy of taste, must be united an
expansion of mind, and a refinement of thought, which is the result of