been united in an earlier being and a diviner sphere; and there was in
the young face on which Ernest gazed precisely this ineffable harmony
with his preconceived notions of the beautiful. Many a nightly and
noonday reverie was realised in those mild yet smiling eyes of the
darkest blue; in that ingenuous breadth of brow, with its
slightly-pencilled arches, and the nose, not cut in that sharp and clear
symmetry which looks so lovely in marble, but usually gives to flesh and
blood a decided and hard character, that better becomes the sterner than
the gentler sex--no; not moulded in the pure Grecian, nor in the pure
Roman, cast; but small, delicate, with the least possible inclination to
turn upward, that was only to be detected in one position of the head,
and served to give a prettier archness to the sweet flexile lips, which,
from the gentleness of their repose, seemed to smile unconsciously, but
rather from a happy constitutional serenity than from the giddiness of
mirth. Such was the character of this fair child's countenance, on
which Maltravers turned and gazed involuntarily and reverently, with
something of the admiring delight with which we look upon the Virgin of
a Rafaele, or the sunset landscape of a Claude. The girl did not appear
to feel any premature coquetry at the evident, though respectful
admiration she excited. She met the eyes bent upon her, brilliant and
eloquent as they were, with a fearless and unsuspecting gaze, and
pointed out to her companion, with all a child's quick and unrestrained
impulse, the shining and raven gloss, the arched and haughty neck, of
Ernest's beautiful Arabian.

Now there happened between Maltravers and the young object of his
admiration a little adventure, which served, perhaps, to fix in her
recollection this short encounter with a stranger; for certain it is
that, years after, she did remember both the circumstances of the
adventure and the features of Maltravers. She wore one of those large