LXXIII.
His was a beautiful and attractive old age, to which nothing was wanting but the security of a morrow. It was so disinterested and parental, that it in no wise offended the eye, though associated with a young and lovely woman. It was as an evening shade upon the bloom of morning; but one felt that it was a protecting shade, sheltering but not withering her youth, beauty, and innocence. The features of this celebrated man were regular as the pure outline of antique profiles which time emaciates slightly, but cannot impair. His blue eyes had that softened but penetrating expression of worn-out sight, as if they looked through a slight haze. There was an arch expression of implied meaning in his mouth; and his smile was playful as that of a father to his little children. His hair, which age and study had thinned, was soft and fine, like the down of a swan. His hands were white and taper as the marble hands of the statue of Seneca taking his dying leave of Paulina. There were no wrinkles on his face, which had become thin and pale from the long labor of the mind, for it had never been plump. A few blue and bloodless veins might be traced on the depressed temples; the light of the fire was reflected on the forehead,—that latest beauty of man, which thought chisels and polishes unceasingly. There was in the cheek that delicacy of skin,—that transparency of a face which has grown old within the shade of walls, and which neither wind nor sun have ever tanned; the complexion of woman, which gives an effeminacy to the countenance of old men, and the ethereal, fragile, and impalpable appearance of a vision, that the slightest breath might dispel. His calm and well-weighed expressions, naturally set in clear, concise, and lucid phrase, had all the precision of one who has been used to careful selection in clothing his thoughts for writing or dictation. His sentences were interrupted by long pauses, as if to allow time for them to penetrate the ear, and to be appreciated by the mind of the listener; he relieved them, every now and then, by graceful pleasantry, never degenerating into coarseness, as though he purposely upheld the conversation on these light and sportive wings, to prevent its being borne down by the weight of too continuous ideas.