fictile graces. She rather affected,
prematurely, the dress and appearance of an elderly woman. I
remember her as always the same, very small and neat, very pretty
with her chiselled nose, the fair oval of her features, the
slightly ironic, slightly meditative smile, the fascinating colour
of the steady eyes, beautifully set in the head, with the eyebrows
rather lifted as in a perpetual amusement of curiosity. Her head,
slightly sunken into the shoulders, was often poised a little
sideways, like a bird's that contemplates a hemp-seed. She had no
quick movements, no gestures; she held herself very still. It
always appeared to me that, in face of her indomitable energy and
love of observation, this was an unconscious economy of force. It
gave her a very peculiar aspect; I remember once frivolously saying
to her that she looked as though she were going to "pounce" at me;
but she never pounced. When she had to move, she rose energetically
and moved with determination, but she never wasted a movement. Her
physical strength--and she such a tiny creature--seemed to be
wonderful. She was seldom unwell, although, like most very healthy
people, she bewailed herself with exaggerated lamentations whenever
anything was the matter with her. But even on these occasions she
defied what she called "coddling." Once I found her suffering from
a cold, on a very chilly day, without a fire, and I expostulated.
She replied, with a sort of incongruity very characteristic of her,
"Oh! none of your hot bottles for me!" In her last hours of
consciousness she battled with the doctor's insistence that she
must have a fire in her bedroom, and her children had to conceal
the flame behind screens because she threatened to get out of bed
and put it out. Her marvellous physical force has to be insisted
on, for it was the very basis of her character.

Her humorous petulance, her little sharp changes of voice, the
malice of her downcast eyes, the calmness of her demure and easy
smile--how is any impression to be given of things so fugitive?
Her life, which had not been without its troubles and anxieties,
became one of prolonged and intense enjoyment. I think that this
was the main reason of the delight which her company gave to almost
every one. She was like a household blaze upon a r