Lorenzo fancied he comprehended, at least in a degree, the character which, in her youthful way, she strove to depict; but yet there was something in the look of Leonora's father which left a dark, unpleasant impression upon his mind. There are faces that we love not, but which afford no apparent reason for the antipathy they produce. There is often even beauty which we cannot admire--grace which affords no pleasure. There is, perhaps, nothing more graceful upon earth than the gliding of a snake, never for a moment quitting what the great moral painter called "the line of beauty." There is nothing more rich and resplendent than his jewelled skin, and yet how few men can gaze upon the most gorgeous of that reptile race without a shuddering sensation of its enmity to man? Can it be that in the breast of the reasoning human creature, God, for a farther security than mere intellect against a being that is likely to injure, implants an instinct of approaching danger which no fairness of form, no engagingness of manner can at first compensate? It may be so. At all events, I have seen instances where something very like it was apparent. And yet, with time, the impression wears away; the spirit has spoken once its word of warning; if that word is not enough, it never speaks again. The snake has the power of fascinating the bird which, in the beginning, strove to escape from him; and we forget the monitor which told us our danger. In an hour from that time Lorenzo was sitting at the same table with Ramiro d'Orco, listening well pleased to searching and deep views of the state of Italy, expressed, not indeed with eloquence, for he was not an eloquent man, but with a force and point he had seldom heard equalled. It would not be easy to give his words, for, even were they recorded, they would lose their strength in the translation; but the substance we know, and it would give a very different picture of Italy in that day from any that can be drawn at present. We see it not alone dimmed by the distance of time, but in a haze of our own prejudices. We may gather, perhaps, the great results; but we can, I believe, in no degree divine the motives, and most of the details are lost. Read the history of any one single man in those days, as portrayed by modern writers, and compare one author with another. Take for instance that of Lorenzo de Medici, as carefully drawn by Roscoe, or brightly sketched by Sismondi. What can be more different? The facts, indeed, are the same, but how opposite are all the inferences. In both we have the dry bones of the man, but the form of the muscle, and the hue of the complexion are entirely at variance. Writers who undertake to represent the things of a past age are like a painter required to furnish portraits of persons long dead. Tradition may give them some guidance as to the general outline, but the features and the colouring will be their own.