resplendent in the new peacock-blue dress, with hat and parasol
to match, and a little creamy lamb's-wool scarf thrown with artful
carelessness around her pretty neck and shoulders. Harry looked at
her with unfeigned admiration. Indeed, you would not easily find
many lighter or more fairly-like little girls than Edie Oswald,
even in the beautiful half-Celtic South Hams of Devon. In figure
she was rather small than short, for though she was but a wee thing,
her form was so exactly and delicately modelled that she might have
looked tall if she stood alone at a little distance. She never
walked, but seemed to dance about from place to place, so buoyant
and light, that Harry doubted whether in her case gravitation could
really vary as the square of the distance--it seemed, in fact,
to be almost diminished in the proportions of the cube. Her hair
and eyes--such big bright eyes!--were dark; but her complexion
was scarcely brunette, and the colour in her cheeks was rich and
peach-like, after the true Devonian type. She was dimpled whenever
she smiled, and she smiled often; her full lips giving a peculiar
ripe look to her laughing mouth that suited admirably with her
light and delicate style of beauty. Perhaps some people might have
thought them too full; certainly they irresistibly suggested to
a critical eye the distinct notion of kissability. As she stood
there, faintly blushing, waiting to be admired by her brother, in
her neatly fitting dainty blue dress, her lips half parted, and her
arms held carelessly at her side, she looked about as much like a
fairy picture as it is given to mere human flesh and blood to look.

'It's delicious, Edie,' said Harry, surveying her from, head
to foot with a smile of satisfaction which made her blush deepen;
'it's simply delicious. Where on earth did you get the idea of it?'