Not a tall man as men grow on that Kentucky plateau; and looking less
than his stature by reason of being so strongly built, square-standing,
ponderous; his muscles here and there perceivable under his loosely
fitting sack-suit of dark-gray tweeds; so that out of respect for
strength which is both manhood and manliness, your eye travelled
approvingly over his proportions: measuring the heavy legs down to the
boots; the heavy arms out to the wrists; the heavy square thick muscular
warm hands; and the heavy torso up to the short neck rising full out of
a low turned-down collar.
In this neck an animal wildness and virile ferocity--not subdued, not
stamped out, partly tamed by a will. Overtopping this neck a tremendous
head covered with short glossy black hair, curling blue-black hair. In
this head a powerful blunt nose, set like the muzzle of a big gun
pointed to fire a heavy projectile at a distant target--the nose of a
never-releasing tenacity. Above this nose, right and left, thick black
brows, the bars of nature's iron purpose. Under these brows wonderful
grayish eyes with glints of Scotch blue in them or of Irish blue or of
Saxon blue; for the blood of three races ran thick in his veins and
mingled in the confusions of his character: blue that was in the eyes of
earlier Scottish men, exulting in heather and highland stag; or the blue
of other eyes that had looked meltingly on golden-haired minstrel and
gold-framed harp--eyes that might have poured their love into Isolde's
or have faded out in the death of Tristan; or the blue of still other
eyes--archers who had shot their last arrows and, dying, drew themselves
to the feet of Harold, their blue-eyed king fighting for Saxon England's
right and might.
They were eyes that could look you to the core with intelligence and
then rest upon you from the outside with sympathy for all that he had
seen to be human in you whether of strength or of weakness--but never of
meanness. Under the blunt nose a thick stubby mustache trimmed short,
leaving exposed the whole red mouth--the mouth of great passions--no
paltry passions--none despicable or contemptible.
On the whole a man who advances upon you with all there is in him and
without waiting for you to advance upon him; no stepping aside for
people in this world by this man, nor stepping timidly over things. Even
as he stood there a motionless figure, he diffused an influence most
warm and human, gay and tragic, irresistible. A man loved secretly or
openly by many women. A man that men were glad to come to confide in,
when they crossed the frontiers of what Balzac, speaking of the soldiers
of Napoleon, called their miserable joys and joyous miseries.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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