But though it offered violence to romantic and conventional notions of poetical beauty, and gave his countenance a contour very different from the profile of the delusive portraits, it may not be imagined that the 'little turn-up nose' caused Shelley to be otherwise than a man of a singularly striking and charming appearance. Tall for his years, from his childhood till he attained the fullness of his stature, Shelley had a slender figure that would not have wanted elegance, had it not been for the slight drooping and roundness of his shoulders, the narrowness of his chest, and the forward inclination of his long neck and minute head--peculiarities scarcely reconcilable with all that has been written about his personal stateliness. To imagine that the young man who paced the streets of Oxford and London 'with bent knees and outstretched neck' (in the manner described by Hogg), was remarkable for the grace and dignity of his carriage, is to surrender one's judgment to the sway of romantic biographers. None the less certain, however, is it that there were moments when Shelley's countenance might be commended for loveliness. Remarkable for a complexion, in which carmine-red and delicate white, instead of being blended, were separately conspicuous, even when it was most freckled by exposure to the sun, the face surmounting his long and slender frame was singularly expressive of intelligence, sympathy, nervous alertness, enthusiasm, and sincerity. Dull in moments of contemplation, the prominent deep-blue eyes of Trelawny's stag-eyed Shelley were comparable with Byron's grey-blue eyes, for overpowering vehemence under the impulses of strong and sudden emotion. Though inferior to Byron's feminine mouth in beauty, and even more deficient than Byron's mouth in power, Shelley's mouth--the one symmetrical part of his unsymmetrical countenance--was notable for shapeliness, and alike expressive of sensibility and refinement.