 detain them.

CHAPTER XIV.

When Miss Stanley came in to make breakfast, she beautifully exemplified the worthy housekeeper's description. I have sometimes seen young women, whose simplicity was destitute of elegance, and others in whom a too elaborate polish had nearly effaced their native graces: Lucilla appeared to unite the simplicity of nature to the refinement of good breeding. It was thus she struck me at first sight. I forbore to form a decided opinion till I had leisure to observe whether her mind fulfilled all that her looks promised.

Lucilla Stanley is rather perfectly elegant than perfectly beautiful. I have seen women as striking, but I never saw one so interesting. Her beauty is countenance: it is the stamp of mind intelligibly printed on the face. It is not so much the symmetry of features as the joint triumph of intellect and sweet temper. A fine old poet has well described her:

Her pure and eloquent blood
Spoke in her cheeks and so distinctly wrought.
That one could almost say her body thought.
Her conversation, like her countenance, is compounded of liveliness, sensibility, and delicacy. She does not say things to be quoted, but the effect of her conversation is that it leaves an impression of pleasure on the mind, and a love of goodness on the heart. She enlivens without dazzling, and entertains without overpowering. Contented to please, she has no ambition to shine. There is nothing like effort in her expression, or vanity in her manner. She has rather a playful gayety than a pointed wit. Of repartee she has little, and dislikes it in others; yet I have seldom met with a truer taste for inoffensive wit. This is indeed the predominating quality of her mind; and she may rather be said to be a nice judge of the genius of others than to be a genius herself. She has a quick perception of whatever is beautiful or defective in composition or in character. The same true taste pervades her writing, her conversation, her dress, her domestic arrangements, and her gardening, for which last she has both a passion and a talent. Though she has a correct ear, she neither sings nor plays; and her taste is so exact in drawing, that she really seems to have le compass dans l'[oe]uil; yet I never saw a pencil in her fingers, except to sketch a seat or a bower for the pleasure-grounds. Her notions are too just to allow her to be satisfied with mediocrity in any thing, and for perfection in many things, she thinks that life is too short, and its duties too various
