She herself was endowed with no mean artistic talent, her specialty
being the painting of flowers in water colors, and, as she always
sketched from nature, she had become almost as much of a botanical
student as her husband was a mineralogical.
But this morning the quaintness and quiet of the village tempted her
into a stroll down its long street, before she should seek the pine
woods farther back, in search of hidden beauties, and one picture that
she came upon held her spell bound for a moment. This was a small, poor
cottage, painted only by the sun and rain, before which, on a tiny
square of green, a baby was rolling about--a cunning little fellow with
rings of silky light hair, while on the low doorstep sat a girl of such
unusual appearance that the lady stared in undisguised admiration.
Her head was bent above a book, and the auburn shades of her luxuriant
hair caught the sunlight in every wave and tendril; her eyes were cast
down, but the dark lashes curled upward from the slightly flushed cheek
thick and long, while the brows were as daintily perfect as if laid on
with a camel's hair brush; the nose was straight and delicate; the
mouth, now set with deep thought, firm and sweet, while the chin carried
out this look of decision, and would have been almost too square but for
the coquettish little cleft which gave it the needed touch of
femininity.
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