Page:A Voice from the Nile, and Other Poems. (Thomson, Dobell).djvu/26

 when they looked at her, and by which the dullest and most literal were impressed, without knowing why. The shape of her head and the turn of her neck and bust was peculiarly noble, and the long golden-brown hair, that floated like a cloud around it, the deep spiritual gravity of her violet-blue eyes, shaded by heavy fringes of golden-brown, all marked her out from other children, and made every one turn and look after her, as she glided hither and thither. Nevertheless, the little one was not what you would have called either a grave child or a sad one. On the contrary, an airy and innocent playfulness seemed to flicker like the shadow of summer leaves over her childish face, and around her buoyant figure Always dressed in white, she seemed to move like a shadow through all sorts of places without contracting spot or stain; and there was not a corner or nook where those fairy footsteps had not glided, and that visionary golden head, with its deep blue eyes, fleeted along."

It is to be observed that this is the portrait of quite a young girl; but it is obvious that a very slight degree of alteration is needed to make it apply to one much older. Moreover, the passage I have quoted agrees so well with the various references in Mr. Thomson's writings to his lost love, that I can hardly doubt that it is an essentially true picture of her. We have in "Vane's Story" a description of her which will well bear comparison with the above extract: