"Her eyes have a mild light, but they awe when she pleases; they
command, like a good man out of office, not by authority, but by virtue.
"Her stature is not tall; she is not made to be the admiration of
everybody, but the happiness of one.
"She has all the firmness that does not exclude delicacy; she has all
the softness that does not imply weakness.
"Her voice is a soft low music--not formed to rule in public assemblies,
but to charm those who can distinguish a company from a crowd; it has
this advantage--YOU MUST COME CLOSE TO HER TO HEAR IT.
"To describe her body describes her mind--one is the transcript of
the other; her understanding is not shown in the variety of matters it
exerts itself on, but in the goodness of the choice she makes.
"She does not display it so much in saying or doing striking things, as
in avoiding such as she ought not to say or do.
"No person of so few years can know the world better; no person was ever
less corrupted by the knowledge of it.
"Her politeness flows rather from a natural disposition to oblige, than
from any rules on that subject, and therefore never fails to strike
those who understand good breeding and those who do not.
"She has a steady and firm mind, which takes no more from the solidity
of the female character than the solidity of marble does from its polish
and lustre. She has such virtues as make us value the truly great of
our own sex. She has all the winning graces that make us love even the
faults we see in the weak and beautiful, in hers."
Let us give, as a companion picture, the not less beautiful delineation
of a husband, that of Colonel Hutchinson, the Commonwealth man, by his
widow. Shortly before his death, he enjoined her "not to grieve at the
common rate of desolate women." And, faithful to his injunction, instead
of lamenting his loss, she indulged her noble sorrow in depicting her
husband as he had lived.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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