He was of ordinary height; his face, which won upon
all who saw him by its delicacy and sweetness, was warm in the
flesh-tints, though without color, and relieved by a small moustache
and imperial a la Mazarin. Without this evidence of virility he might
have resembled a young woman in disguise, so refined was the shape of
his face and the cut of his lips, so feminine the transparent ivory of
a set of teeth, regular enough to have seemed artificial. Add to these
womanly points a habit of speech as gentle as the expression of the
face; as gentle, too, as the blue eyes with their Turkish eyelids, and
you will readily understand how it was that the minister occasionally
called his young secretary Mademoiselle de La Briere. The full, clear
forehead, well framed by abundant black hair, was dreamy, and did not
contradict the character of the face, which was altogether melancholy.
The prominent arch of the upper eyelid, though very beautifully cut,
overshadowed the glance of the eye, and added a physical sadness,--if
we may so call it,--produced by the droop of the lid over the eyeball.
This inward doubt or eclipse--which is put into language by the word
modesty--was expressed in his whole person.
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