216 RAMBLES OF A NATURALIST. 



well developed forehead, a straight nose, a very 

 delicately chiselled mouth, an oval face, which be- 

 comes narrower towards the chin, large black eyes, 

 black hair and eyebrows, a clear brown complexion, 

 and an average sized but perfectly well propor- 

 tioned figure, together with small and well shaped 

 hands and feet. Owing to their seldom intermixing 

 with other races, this type has been preserved, more 

 especially in the mountains of Guipuzcoa and Biscay, 

 with a surprising degree of purity. I have very 

 frequently had occasion in crowded assemblies at 

 Saint Sebastian to observe that for one somewhat 

 homely face there were some twenty or thirty of 

 really magnificent beauty. 



The women more especially possessed in a high 

 degree these characteristics of their race.* Their 

 features, which are at once regular and animated, 

 their large and expressive eyes, their delicately 

 chiselled lips, which are almost always parted with a 

 half sarcastic smile, and their long hair, which either 

 falls in tresses nearly to their feet, or is wound round 

 their heads like a natural diadem, combine to produce 

 a picture which cannot fail to strike even the most 

 careless observer. They are almost all distinguished 

 for the delicacy of outline of the neck and shoulders, 

 and this feature of beauty, which is generally of such 

 rare occurrence, imparts even to the humblest peasant 

 a certain air of grace and nobleness which even a 

 duchess might envy. I do not exaggerate when I 



* This is a fact -which is well known to all ethnologists. The 

 essential characters of the race are always more strongly marked 

 and more constantly present in women than in men. 



