His  features  were  high,  yet  delicate,  and  his  mouth,  which,  when
closed,  assumed  a  firm  and  rather  severe  expression,  softened,
when  speaking,  into  a  smile  of  almost  magical  enchantment.
Richly  but  not  extravagantly  dressed,  he  appeared  to  cultivate,
rather  than  disdain,  the  ornaments  of  outward  appearance  ;  and
whatever  can  fascinate  or  attract  was  so  inherent  in  this  singu-
lar man  that  all  which  in  others  would  have  been  most  artificial
was  in  him  most  natural ;  so  that  it  is  no  exaggeration  to  add
that  to  be  well  dressed  seemed  to  the  elegance  of  his  person  not
so  much  the  result  of  art  as  of  a  property  innate  and  peculiar  to
himself.
Such  was  the  outward  appearance  of  Henry  St.  John  ;  one
well  suited  to  the  qualities  of  a  mind  at  once  more  vigorous  and
more  accomplished  than  that  of  any  other  other  person  with


36  DEVEREUX.
whom  the  vicissitudes  of  my  life  have  ever  brought  me  into
contact.
I  kept  my  eye  on  the  new  guest  throughout  the  whole  day  ;  I
observed  the  mingled  liveliness  and  softness  which  pervaded  his
attentions  to  women,  the  intellectual  yet  unpedantic  superiority
he  possessed  in  his  conversations  with  men  ;  his  respectful  de-
meanor to  age  ;  his  careless,  yet  not  over-familiar,  ease  with  the
young ;  and,  what  interested  me  more  than  all,  the  occasional
cloud  which  passed  over  his  countenance  at  moments  when  he
seemed  sunk  into  a  revery  that  had  for  its  objects  nothing  in
common  with  those  around  him.
