For lovely the Queen most certainly was, indeed it is the only word which adequately expresses the perfection of her charms. The Izreelite women were, as the young Englishmen had already had opportunity to observe, mostly of more than prepossessing appearance, tall, stately, statuesque creatures of Juno-like proportions, with melting dark eyes, and luxuriant tresses of dark, curly hair. But Queen Myra's beauty was of a totally different type, for she was _petite_ yet exquisitely formed, fair as the dawn of a summer's day, with golden-brown locks, and eyes as blue as the sapphire sky overhead. So lovely indeed was she that Grosvenor, surprised out of his manners, whistled softly, and remarked to Dick, in quite audible tones: "Phew! Dick, my boy, did you ever see such a beauty in all your born days? No wonder that these old jossers the Elders are anxious to keep the darling alive--eh, what?" As he spoke the faintest suspicion of a smile seemed to flicker for a moment in the eyes of the Queen, but Dick, who noticed it, thought it must have been provoked by Malachi's genuflexions as he performed the ceremony of introduction, pointing to Dick first as the physician, and then to Grosvenor as the friend who had journeyed with him across the Great Water, and who, happening in some mysterious way--which he, Malachi, did not pretend to understand--to possess some slight knowledge of the Izreelite tongue, would act as interpreter between Her Majesty and the physician. By the time that Malachi had finished his speech the terrible listlessness and indifference of the Queen's manner, which had for so many months been a source of anxiety to the nation in general and the Elders and nobles in particular, had completely vanished, and she electrified the chief Elder by raising herself upon her couch and bidding him imperiously to be gone and to leave her alone with her ladies and the two strangers. The poor old gentleman, his head dizzy with many conflicting emotions, hastily bowed himself out, and was halfway back to his own quarters in the Legislature before he well knew whether he was on his head or his heels. The door had no sooner closed upon Malachi than an extraordinary change took place in the appearance and demeanour of the Queen; the languor of her attitude and the absolute listlessness and indifference with which she had regarded her chief Elder vanished as if by magic. Her eyes lit up eagerly, a wave of colour suffused her hitherto marble-white cheeks and brow, and, turning to her two visitors, she astounded them by exclaiming in excellent English, with only a trace of accent, as she stretched out her hands toward them: "Gentlemen--gentlemen, are you indeed English, or has my poor brain at last given way under the strain of my terrible trouble?"