“I never knew how beautiful, how more than beautiful, American nature is till I had seen the famous scenes of Europe. One-half the superiority is association, and half the other half is because attention has been called to them by voices to which people listened. Our very climate is richer. Here nobody knows how beautiful the skies can be. They like sunshine, and rainy weather is for them always _brutto tempo_. The grandeur of a storm, the exquisite beauty of showery summer weather and of falling and fallen snow, they know nothing about. They endure the rainy season for the sake of the crops, scolding and shivering all the time. To watch with pleasure a direct, pelting, powerful rain would never enter their minds; and if they see you gazing at the most glorious clouds imaginable, it would be to them nothing but _curioso_. We do not need to go abroad for natural beauty.” It was getting late and time to say good-night. A silence fell on them, and a sense of waiting. Then Mr. Vane said: “We have made a Novena together for the communion of this morning. May we not once more say our prayers together in thanksgiving?” No one replied in words; but the Signora brought a prayer-book and arranged the lamp beside Mr. Vane. He obeyed her mute request, and for the first time, as head of the family, led the family devotions. Then they took a silent leave of each other. NATALIE NARISCHKIN.[8] Footnote 8: _La Sœur Natalie Narischkin_, _Fille de la Charité de S. Vincent de Paul_. Par Mme. Augustus Craven. Paris: Didier et Cie., 35 Quai des Augustins. The name of Narischkin is in Russia like the name of Bourbon in France, Plantagenet or Stuart in Great Britain. The mother of Peter the Great was a Narischkin, and her baptismal name was Natalie. The family have always esteemed themselves too noble to accept even the highest titles, regarding their patronymic as a designation more honorable than that of prince. Madame Craven has just added to the list of her charming and extremely popular works a new one, which is a companion to the _Sister’s Story_, by writing the biography of a lady of the Narischkin family who was a Catholic and a Sister of Charity. Natalie was a friend of Alexandrine and Olga de la Ferronays. The narrative of her early life retraces the ground, familiar to so many, over which we have delightfully wandered in company with the fascinating group of elect souls, whose passage over the drear desert of our age has been like the waving of angels’ wings in a troubled atmosphere.