BTKONS "MAID OF ATHENS. 



131 



intrusion, and a sadder or a sweeter ! to wish him and his family every 

 smile I never saw. She said her happiness. A servant-girl, very 

 welcome in a few simple words of shabbily dressed, stood at the side 

 Italian, and I thought there were j door, and we offered her some 



money, which she might have 

 taken unnoticed. She drew her- 

 self up very coldly, and refused it, 



few sweeter voices in the world. 

 I her if she had not learned 

 English yet. She coloured, and 



lid, "No, signore!" and the deep 

 spot in her cheek faded gradually 

 down in tints a painter would re- 

 member. Her husband, she said, 

 had wished to learn her language, 

 Mid v/ould never let her speak 

 !i. I began to feel a preju- 

 vainst him. Presently a boy 

 of perhaps three years came into 

 the room an ugly, white-headed, 

 Scotch-looking little ruffian, thin- 

 lipped and freckled, and my aver- 

 sion for Mr. Blaek became quite 

 decided. " Did you not regret 

 leaving Athens'?" I asked, "very 

 much, signore," she answered with 

 half a sigh ; " but my husband dis- 

 likes Athens." Horrid Mr. Black ! 

 thought I. I wished to ask her of 

 Lord Byron, but I had heard that 

 the poet's admiration had occa- 

 sioned the usual scandal attendant 

 on every land of pre-eminence, and 

 her modest and timid manners, 

 while they assured me of her pu- 

 rity of heart, made me afraid to 

 venture where there was even a 

 possibility of wounding her. She 

 sat in a drooping attitude on the 

 coarsely-covered divan, which oc- 

 cupied three sides of the little 

 room, and it was difficult to be- 

 lieve that any eye but her hus- 

 band's had ever looked upon her, 

 or that the " wdls of her heart" 

 had ever been drawn upon for any- 

 thing deeper than the simple du- 

 ties of a wife and mother. She 

 offered us some sweetmeats, the 

 usual Greek compliment to visi- 

 tors, as we rose to go, and, laying 

 her hand upon her heart, in the 

 beautiful custom of the country, re- 

 quested me to express her thanks 

 to the commodore for the honour 

 he had done her in calling, and 



as if she thought we had quite 

 mistaken her. In a country where 

 gifts of the kind are so univer- 

 sal, it spoke well for the pride of 

 the family, at least. I turned after 

 we had taken leave, and made an 

 apology to speak to her again ; for 

 in the interest of the general im- 

 pression she had made upon me I 

 had forgotten to notice her dress, 

 and I was not sure that I could 

 remember a single feature of her 

 face. We had called unexpectedly, 

 of course, and her dress was very 

 plain. A red cloth cap, bound 

 about the temples with a coloured 

 shawl, whose folds were mingled 

 with large braids of dark-brown 

 hair, and decked with a tassel of 

 blue silk, which fell to her left 

 shoulder, formed her head-dress. 

 In other respects she was dressed 

 like a European. She is a little 

 above the middle height, slight and 

 well formed, and walks weakly, like 

 most Greek women, as if her feet 

 were too small for her weight. 

 Her skin is dark and clear, and 

 she has a colour in her cheek and 

 lips that looks to me consumptive. 

 Her teeth are white and regular, 

 her face oval, and her forehead and 

 nose form the straight line of the 

 Grecian model one of the few in- 

 stances I have ever seen of it. Her 

 eyes are largo, and of a soft, liquid 

 hazel, and this is her chief beauty. 

 There is that " looking out of the 

 soul through them," which Byron 

 always described as constituting 

 the loveliness that most moved 

 him. I made up my mind, as we 

 walked away, that she would be a 

 lovely woman anywhere. Her hor- 

 rid name, and the unprepossessing 

 circumstances in which we i'ouna 



