d she might easily have
walked out of one of the canvases in the Pitti or the Ufizzi, or
the Belli Arti. Her hair is Botticelli hair, and that "reticence of
the flesh" of which one of your American novelists
speaks--Harrison, isn't it?--and that faint austerity.

She sang quantities of _arias_ and groups of songs of all nations,
and at the end she did some American Indian things,--the native
melodies themselves arranged in modern fashion. I expect you know
them. The words are very simple and touching and the Italian
translations are sufficiently funny. Well, the very last of all was
something about a captive Indian maid, and a young chap here who
clearly adores her and whom she hasn't even taken in upon her
retina played a wailing, haunting accompaniment on the flute. As
nearly as I can remember it went something like:

From the Land of the Sky Blue Water
They brought a captive maid.
Her eyes were deep as the--(I can't remember what, Stephen)
But she was not afraid.
I go to her tent in the evening
And woo her with my flute,
But she dreams of the Sky Blue Water,
And the captive maid is mute.

My dear Stephen, I give you my word that I very nearly put my nose
in the air and howled. She _is_ a captive maid--captive to her
talent and the fat song-bird and her mother's ambition and yours,
and her mother's determination not to let her marry her lad, and to
that Carter chap, and the boy playing the flute--the whole network
of you,--but she's dreaming of the Sky Blue Water, and dreaming is
doing with that child. You'd best make up your minds to it, and
settle some money on them and marry them off. My word, Stephen, is
there so much of it lying about in the world that you can afford to
be reckless with it? I arrived too late to see her before the
concert, and I went behind--together with the bulk of the American
and English colonies--directly it was over. She was tremendously
glad to see me; I was a sort of link, you know. When I started in
to tell her how splendidly she'd sung and how every one was
rejoicing she said, "Yes,--thanks--isn't every one sweet? But did
Stepper write you that Jimsy was 'Varsity Captain this year, and
that they beat Berkeley twelve to five? And that Jimsy made _both_