of beauty, which is not liable to be either /koine/ or /poine/. And
Favorinus, who was a remarkably sensible man, and came from Provence--the
male inhabitants of which district have always valued themselves on their
knowledge of love and ladies--calls this said /stata forma/ the beauty of
wives,--the uxorial beauty. Ennius says that women of a /stata forma/
are almost always safe and modest. Now, Jemima, you observe, is
described as possessing this /stata forma/; and it is the nicety of your
observation in this respect, which I like the most in the whole of your
description of a philosopher's matrimonial courtship, Pisistratus
(excepting only the stroke of the spectacles), for it shows that you had
properly considered the opinion of Bias, and mastered all the counter
logic suggested in Book v., chapter xi., of Aulus Gellius."

"For all that," said Blanche, half archly, half demurely, with a smile in
the eye and a pout of the lip, "I don't remember that Pisistratus, in the
days when he wished to be most complimentary, ever assured me that I had
a /stata forma/,--a rational, mediocre sort of beauty."

"And I think," observed my uncle, "that when he comes to his real
heroine, whoever she may be, he will not trouble his head much about
either Bias or Aulus Gellius."




CHAPTER II.

Matrimony is certainly a great change in life. One is astonished not to
find a notable alteration in one's friend, even if he or she have been
only wedded a week. In the instance of Dr. and Mrs. Riccabocca the