in her hand, a great straw hat with a crimson ribbon, a white
muslin jacket, you know, bound at the waist with a ribbon of the first,
and a dark skirt, with a shawl round her feet, which Kuhn had arranged.
As she stopped, the donkey fell to cropping greens in the hedge; the
trees there chequered her white dress and face with shadow. Her eyes,
hair, and forehead were in shadow, too, but the light was all upon her
right cheek. Upon her shoulder down to her arm, which was of a warmer
white, and on the bunch of flowers which she held, blue, yellow, and red
poppies, and so forth.

"J. J. says, 'I think the birds began to sing louder when she came.' We
have both agreed that she is the handsomest woman in England. It's not
her form merely, which is certainly as yet too thin and a little angular;
it is her colour. I do not care for women or pictures without colour. Oh,
ye carnations! Oh, such black hair and solemn eyebrows. It seems to me
the roses and carnations have bloomed again since we saw them last in
London, when they were drooping from the exposure to night air, candle
light, and heated ballrooms.

"Here I was in the midst of a regiment of donkeys bearing a crowd of
relations; J. J. standing modestly in the background, beggars completing
the group. Throw in the Rhine in the distance flashing by the Seven
Mountains--but mind and make Ethel the principal figure: if you make her
like she certainly _will_ be, and other lights will be only minor fires.
You may paint her form, but can't paint her colour."

Thus wrote Clive from Bonn, and now that the old Countess and Barnes were
away, the barrier between Clive and this family was withdrawn. The young
folks who loved him were free to see him as often as he would come. They
were going to Baden: would he come, too? He was glad enough to go with
them, and to travel in the orbit of such a lovely girl as Ethel Newcome,
whose beauty made all the passengers on all the steamers look round and
admire. The journey was all sunshine and pleasure and novelty; and I like
to think of the pretty girl and the gallant young fellow enjoying this
holiday. Few sights are more pleasant than to watch a happy, manly
English youth, freehanded and generous-hearted, content and good-humour
shining in his honest face, pleased and pleasing, eager, active, and
thankful for services, and exercising bravely his noble youthful
privilege to be happy and to enjoy. As for J. J., he, too, had his share
of enjoy