verness
think there would soon be another dinner party? and didn't the
Governess, when _she_ was a little girl, wish very much she was a
grown up woman? and, finally, she wished she had been able to talk
when she was a baby at her christening, because then me would have
begged the Fairy Godmother to give her the gift of growing up to be a
young lady very quick indeed, and of learning every thing without any
trouble at all! And so saying, Aurora yawned and laid down her book,
and the poor Governess could hardly keep her temper at such repeated
interruptions to the subject in hand.

"My dear," she exclaimed, "Fairies have no power to counteract what
God, has ordained, and he has ordained that we enjoy but little what
we get at without labour and trouble."

"Ah taisez-vous donc ma chere!" cried Aurora, flopping her ears with
her hands, and running round the room shaking her long curls
furiously. "Vous me faites absolument fremir! Excuse my French, but I
am certain you are the eldest daughter of the old woman in the wood,
and you are just now dropping vipers, toads, newts, and efts from your
mouth at every word you utter!"

The good-natured Governess laughed heartily at the joke, for they had
just been reading the old French fairy tale of "Les deux Fees," and
the application amused her; but she shook her head gravely at Aurora
afterwards, and reminded her that no serious truth was well answered
by a joke, however droll.

A bell rings, a carriage is at the door. Miss Aurora is wanted.
Visiters! Ah! here is happiness again! But it lasts but a short time,
and the reaction is the same as before--drooping eyes, languid
eyelids, and a sigh.

Books, drawing, music, work, even domestic recreations, all deprived
of their charm through this idolatry of self!

The curtain closed over this scene.

"A charming child, Ianthe, but for your Fairy Gift, which is spoiling
her."

"I repeat to you we are no judges yet. Now for riches, Euphrosyne!"

* * * * *

At the same hour of evening, and under the same circumstances, of a
party about to assemble, let me introduce you to a beautiful little
boudoir or up-stairs sitting-room adjoining an equally pretty sleeping
apartment in a magnificent house in a town. The passages are carpeted
all over, and so are the boudoir and the sleeping-room, and they are
furnished with sofas, easy chairs, and every description of luxurious
comfort; and all this for the ac