Who is
there, that, at the very mention of Mary Stewart's name, has not her
countenance before him, familiar as that of the mistress of his youth,
or the favourite daughter of his advanced age? Even those who feel
themselves compelled to believe all, or much, of what her enemies laid
to her charge, cannot think without a sigh upon a countenance
expressive of anything rather than the foul crimes with which she was
charged when living, and which still continue to shade, if not to
blacken, her memory. That brow, so truly open and regal--those
eyebrows, so regularly graceful, which yet were saved from the charge
of regular insipidity by the beautiful effect of the hazel eyes which
they overarched, and which seem to utter a thousand histories--the
nose, with all its Grecian precision of outline--the mouth, so well
proportioned, so sweetly formed, as if designed to speak nothing but
what was delightful to hear--the dimpled chin--the stately swan-like
neck, form a countenance, the like of which we know not to have
existed in any other character moving in that class of life, where the
actresses as well as the actors command general and undivided
attention. It is in vain to say that the portraits which exist of this
remarkable woman are not like each other; for, amidst their
discrepancy, each possesses general features which the eye at once
acknowledges as peculiar to the vision which our imagination has
raised while we read her history for the first time, and which has
been impressed upon it by the numerous prints and pictures which we
have seen.
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