Page:A pair of blue eyes (1873 Volume 1).pdf/19

Rh as the blue we see between the retreating mouldings of hills and woody slopes on a sunny September morning. A misty and shady blue, that had no beginning or surface, and was looked into rather than at. Of the two, indeed, perhaps this earthly blue is the more beautiful.

As to her Presence, it was not powerful; it was weak. Some women can make their personality pervade the atmosphere of a whole banqueting hall; Elfride's was no more pervasive that that of a kitten.

Notice, as Elfride's own, the thoughtfulness which appears in the face of the Madonna della Sedia, without its rapture: the warmth and spirit of the type of woman's feature most common to the beauties—mortal or immortal—of Rubens, without their insistent fleshliness. The characteristic expression of the female faces of Correggio—that of the yearning human thoughts that lie too deep for tears—was hers sometimes, but seldom under ordinary conditions.