Mr. Powers called to see me one evening, and poured out, as usual, a
stream of talk, both racy and oracular in its character. Speaking of
human eyes, he observed that they did not depend for their expression
upon color, nor upon any light of the soul beaming through them, nor any
glow of the eyeball, nor upon anything but the form and action of the
surrounding muscles. He illustrates it by saying, that if the eye of a
wolf, or of whatever fiercest animal, could be placed in another setting,
it would be found capable of the utmost gentleness of expression. "You
yourself," said he, "have a very bright and sharp look sometimes; but it
is not in the eye itself." His own eyes, as I could have sworn, were
glowing all the time he spoke; and, remembering how many times I have
seemed to see eyes glow, and blaze, and flash, and sparkle, and melt, and
soften; and how all poetry is illuminated with the light of ladies' eyes;
and how many people have been smitten by the lightning of an eye, whether
in love or anger, it was difficult to allow that all this subtlest and
keenest fire is illusive, not even phosphorescent, and that any other
jelly in the same socket would serve as well as the brightest eye.
Nevertheless, he must be right; of course he must, and I am rather
ashamed ever to have thought otherwise. Where should the light come
from? Has a man a flame inside of his head? Does his spirit manifest
itself in the semblance of flame? The moment we think of it, the
absurdity becomes evident. I am not quite sure, however, that the outer
surface of the eye may not reflect more light in some states of feeling
than in others; the state of the health, certainly, has an influence of
this kind.

I asked Powers what he thought of Michael Angelo's statue of Lorenzo de'
Medici. He allowed that its effect was very grand and mysterious; but
added that it owed this to a trick,--the effect being produced by the
arrangement of the hood, as he called it, or helmet, which throws the