e swelling calf, they terminated in a
small foot, quite at ease, and yet restrained in a small slipper of
black morocco, with silver buckles. Cecily was looking into the glass
over the mantelpiece. The slope of her bodice displayed her elegant and
dimpled neck of dazzling but not transparent whiteness.

Taking off her cap of cherry-coloured velvet to replace it with a
kerchief, she displayed her thick, magnificent head of hair, of lustrous
black, which, divided over her brows, and naturally curling, came down
only to the necklace of Venus, which unites the neck and shoulders.

It is necessary to know the inimitable taste with which the Creoles
twist around their heads their kerchiefs of bright hues, to have an idea
of the graceful head-dress of Cecily, and the piquant contrast of this
variegated covering of purple, blue, and orange, with the black silky
tresses, which, escaping from beneath the tight fold of the
nightkerchief, surrounded her pale but round and firm cheeks. With her
two arms raised above her head, she proceeded with the ends of her
fingers, as slender as spindles of ivory, to arrange a large rosette,
placed very low on the left side, almost over the ear.

Cecily's features were such as once seen it is impossible ever to
forget. A bold forehead, somewhat projecting, surmounts her face, which
was a perfect oval; her pearly white complexion, the satiny freshness of
the camelia leaf slightly touched by a sun-ray; her eyes, of almost
disproportionate size, have a singular expression, for their irises,
extremely large, black, and brilliant, hardly allow the blue
transparency of the orbits, at the two extremities of the lids, fringed
with long lashes, to be visible; her chin is very distinctly prominent;
her nose, straight and thin, ends in two delicate nostrils, which dilate
on the least emotion; her mouth, insolent and amorous, is of bright
purple.

We must imagine this colourless countenance, with its bright black
glance, its two red, pulpy, and humid lips, which glisten like wet
coral. Such was Cecily. Her infamous instincts, at first repressed by
her real attachment for David, not being developed till she reached
Europe, civilisation and the influence of northern climates had tempered
their violence.

We have already said that Cecily had scarcely reached Germany, when,
first seduced by a man of desperately depraved habits, she, unknown to
David, who loved her with equal idolatry and blindness, exercis