An hour later the good soul came forth again into the garden to enjoy her reward. A covered basket on her arm, that same plump, white member tightly folded with its comrade over the crisp muslin kerchief and the capacious bosom; the Swiss straw-hat, tied with a black ribband under the chin, shading, but not concealing the lace cap of fine Mechlin, the curls, and the rosy smiling countenance.... No unpleasing spectacle for any reasonable husband’s eye! So thought the parson. As her shadow fell across the patch of sunshine in front of him, he looked up and smiled from the pages of his book.
The companion of the morning was the Olympian who has immortalised in beauty almost every theme and mood of the human mind. It had struck the divine, whilst inquiringly surveying his shelves, that the noble figure of Prospero would be evoked with singular fitness on this placid October morn. The volume—propped against the glistening decanter of water—was one Baskerville’s edition of Shakespeare and opened at Act IV. of the Tempest.
The rector, brought back from the green sward of the wizard’s cell to his actual surroundings, smilingly looked his inquiry as his spouse stood in patience before him.
“Ah, my delicate Ariel!” said he, with the most benevolent sarcasm.
Nor, as Madam Tutterville gazed down upon him, was she behind him in conjugal complacency. Nay, as her eyes wandered over the handsome countenance with the classic firm roundness of outline, which might have graced a Roman medal, her heart swelled within her with a tender pride.
“What a man is my Horatio!” she thought, not without emphasis on the word “my.” For well she knew how much her care had contributed to that same rich outline.
Everything about this excellent man was ample. Ample the wave of hair that rose in a crest from an expansive brow and still sported a cloud of scented powder after the fashion of his younger years. Ample the curve of his high nose; ample the chin and nobly proportioned. Ample the chest that gently swelled from under the snowy ruffles to that fine display of broadcloth waistcoat where dangled the golden seals and the watch that methodically marked the flight of the rector’s golden moments. But the rector’s legs had so far resisted the encroachment of general amplitude. There the only curve, one in which he took an innocent pride, was a fine line that, under the meshes of well-drawn silk hose, led from knee to heel with clean and elegant finality.
No wonder that Madam Tutterville’s breast should heave with the glory of possession.
Her smile broadened, as she glanced from the well-picked partridge bones to the plump fingers that now toyed with the grapes. She noted also the reticent smile that hovered on the divine’s lips, as if in sympathetic answer to her own. Yet, though she beamed to see her lord so content, the true inwardness of this same content escaped her—naturally enough. What could Madam Sophia know of that thousandth new elusive beauty he had even now discovered in Prospero’s green and yellow island? How could she guess that it had broken upon his mental palate with a flavour cognate to that of the luscious grapes she had provided? What could she know of the spice of genial sarcasm that likened one of her own vast proportions to the ministering sprite of the amiable wizard—and yet saw a delightful modern fitness in the comparison? Far indeed was she from realising the endless amusement her conversation afforded to a mind as accurate on one side as it was humourous on the other.
Sermo index animi. If speech be the mirror of the mind, Doctor Tutterville’s mind revealed itself as elegant, balanced, and polished. Nothing more orderly, more concise, more jealously chosen than his word and enunciation. Nothing, in short, could have been in more absolute contrast to the hurling ambitious volubility of his consort.