'
* * * * *
CHAPTER X
On the evening on which Mr Asterias had caught a glimpse of a female
figure on the sea-shore, which he had translated into the visual sign
of his interior cognition of a mermaid, Scythrop, retiring to his
tower, found his study preoccupied. A stranger, muffled in a cloak,
was sitting at his table. Scythrop paused in surprise. The stranger
rose at his entrance, and looked at him intently a few minutes, in
silence. The eyes of the stranger alone were visible. All the rest
of the figure was muffled and mantled in the folds of a black cloak,
which was raised, by the right hand, to the level of the eyes. This
scrutiny being completed, the stranger, dropping the cloak, said, 'I
see, by your physiognomy, that you may be trusted;' and revealed to
the astonished Scythrop a female form and countenance of dazzling
grace and beauty, with long flowing hair of raven blackness, and
large black eyes of almost oppressive brilliancy, which strikingly
contrasted with a complexion of snowy whiteness. Her dress was
extremely elegant, but had an appearance of foreign fashion, as if
both the lady and her mantua-maker were of 'a far countree.'
'I guess 'twas frightful there to see
A lady so richly clad as she,
Beautiful exceedingly.
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