Knit with a golden bauldrick, which forelay
Athwart her snowy breast, and did divide

Her dainty paps; which, like young fruit in May,
Now little gan to swell; and being tied,

Through their thin weeds their places only signified.”

Dryden copies after Spenser, but not with such refinement. His passage, however, is so beautiful, and has a gentleness and movement so much to the purpose, that I cannot resist the pleasure of quoting it. He is describing Boccaccio's heroine in the story of "Cymon and Iphigenia:”

"By chance conducted, or by thirst constrain'd,
The deep recesses of the grove he gain'd;
Where, in a plain defended by the wood,

Crept through the matted grass a crystal flood,
By which an alabaster fountain stood:

And on the margin of the fount was laid,

Attended by her slaves, a sleeping maid;

}

Like Dian and her nymphs, when, tired with sport,
To rest by cool Eurotas they resort.

The dame herself the goddess well express'd,
Not more distinguish'd by her purple vest,
Than by the charming features of her face,
And e'en in slumber a superior grace.

Her comely limbs composed with decent care,
Her body shaded with a slight cymar,
Her bosom to the view was only bare;
Where two beginning paps were scarcely spied,
For yet their places were but signified.
The fanning wind upon her bosom blows;

To meet the fanning wind the bosom rose;

}

The fanning wind, and purling streams, continue her repose."

This beautiful conclusion, with its repetitions, its play to and fro, and the long continuous line with which it terminates, is delightfully soft and characteristic. The beauty of the sleeper and of the landscape mingle with one another. The wind and the bosom are gentle challengers.

"Each smoother seems than each, and each than each seems smoother."

Even the turn of Dryden's last triplet is imitated from Spenser.-See the divine passage of the concert in the "Bower of Bliss, Faery Queen,” book ii. canto 12, stanza 71. "The sage and serious Spenser," as Milton called him, is a great master of the beautiful in all its branches. He also knew, as well as any poet, how to help himself to beauty out of others. The former passage imitated by Dryden was, perhaps, suggested by one in Boccaccio.* The simile of "young fruit in May" is from Ariosto.

"Bianca neve è il bel collo, e 'l petto latte;

Il collo tondo, il petto colmo e largo:

Due pome acerbe, e pur d'avorio fatte,

Vengono e van, come onda al primo margo,
Quando piacevole aura il mar combatte."

ORLAN. FUR. Canto 7.

Her bosom is like milk, her neck like snow;
A rounded neck; a bosom, where you see
Two crisp young ivory apples come and go,
Like waves that on the shore beat tenderly,
When a sweet air is ruffling to and fro.

* 66 L'Ameto," as above, p. 31, 33.

But Ariosto has been also to Boccaccio, and he to Theocritus; in whom, we believe, this fruitful metaphor is first to be met with. It is very suitable to his shepherds, living among the bowers of Sicily.— See "Idyl" xxvii. v. 49. Sir Philip Sidney has repeated it in the "Arcadia." But poets in all ages have drawn similar metaphors from the gardens. "Solomon's Song" abounds with them. There is a hidden analogy, more than poetical, among all the beauties of nature.

We quit this tender ground, prepared to think very ill of any person who thinks we have said too much of it. Its beauty would not allow us to say less; but not the less do we "with reverence deem" of those resting-places for the head of love and

sorrow

"Those dainties made to still an infant's cries."

CRITICISM ON FEMALE BEAUTY.

IV.-HAND, ARM, WALK, VOICE.

Hand and arm.-Italian epithet "Morbida.”—Figure.—Carriage, &c.—Perils of fashion.-Vice of tight-lacing.—Hips. -Legs and feet.-Walk.-Carriage of Roman and Italian women.-That of English preferred.-Voice ditto.-Reason why the most beautiful women are in general not the most charming.

HAND AND ARM.-A beautiful arm is of a round and flowing outline, and gently tapering; the hand long, delicate, and well turned, with taper fingers, and a certain buoyancy and turn upwards in their very curvature and repose. We fear this is not well expressed. We mean, that when the hand is at rest on its palm, the wrist a little bent, and the other part of it, with the fingers, stretching and dipping forwards with the various undulations of the joints, it ought, however plump and in good condition, to retain a look of promptitude and lightness. The spirit of the guitar ought to be in it; of the harp and the pianoforte, of the performance of all ele

VOL. I.

T

gant works, even to the dairy of Eve, who "tempered dulcet creams."-See a picture in Spenser, not to be surpassed by any Italian pencil:—

"In her left hand a cup of gold she held,

And with her right the riper fruit did reach,
Whose sappy liquor, that with fulness swell'd,
Into her cup she scruz'd with dainty breach
Of her fine fingers, without foul impeach
That so fair wine-press made the wine more sweet."
Book ii. canto 12.

It is sometimes thought that hands and arms cannot be too white. A genuine white is very beautiful, and is requisite to give them perfection; but shape and spirit are the first things in all beauty. Complexion follows. A hand and arm may be beautiful, without being excessively fair: they may also be very fair and not at all beautiful. Above all, a sickly white is not to be admired, whatever may be thought of it by the sallow Italian, who praises a white hand for being morbid. We believe, however, he means nothing more than a contradiction to his yellow. He would have his mistress's complexion unspoilt by oil and macaroni. These excessive terms, as we have before noticed, are not to be taken to the letter. A sick hand has its merits, if it be an honest one. It may excite a feeling beyond beauty. But sickliness is not beauty. In the whitest skin there ought to be a look of health.*

* "Candidis tamen manibus rosei ruboris aliquid suffundatur."-JUNIUS, Cap. ix. sect. 26.