Vengeance, as a mission for _me_, as a
task for _my_ hands in particular, is no longer possible; the
thunder-bolts of retribution have been long since launched by other
hands; and yet still it happens that at times I do--I must--I shall
perhaps to the hour of death, rise in maniac fury, and seek, in the very
impotence of vindictive madness, groping as it were in blindness of
heart, for that tiger from hell-gates that tore away my darling from my
heart. Let me pause, and interrupt this painful strain, to say a word or
two upon what she was--and how far worthy of a love more honourable to
her (that was possible) and deeper (but that was not possible) than
mine. When first I saw her, she--my Agnes--was merely a child, not much
(if anything) above sixteen. But, as in perfect womanhood she retained a
most childlike expression of countenance, so even then in absolute
childhood she put forward the blossoms and the dignity of a woman.
Never yet did my eye light upon creature that was born of woman, nor
could it enter my heart to conceive one, possessing a figure more
matchless in its proportions, more statuesque, and more deliberately and
advisedly to be characterised by no adequate word but the word
_magnificent_ (a word too often and lightly abused). In reality,
speaking of women, I have seen many beautiful figures, but hardly one
except Agnes that could without hyperbole be styled truly and memorably
magnificent. Though in the first order of tall women, yet, being full in
person, and with a symmetry that was absolutely faultless, she seemed to
the random sight as little above the ordinary height. Possibly from the
dignity of her person, assisted by the dignity of her movements, a
stranger would have been disposed to call her at a distance a woman of
_commanding_ presence; but never after he had approached near enough to
behold her face. Every thought of artifice--of practised effect--or of
haughty pretension, fled before the childlike innocence--the sweet
feminine timidity--and the more than cherub loveliness of that
countenance, which yet in its lineaments was noble, whilst its
expression was purely gentle and confiding. A shade of pensiveness there
was about her; but _that_ was in her manners, scarcely ever in her
features; and the exquisite fairness of her complexion, enriched by the
very sweetest and most delicate bloom that ever I have beheld, should
rather have allied it to a tone of cheerfulness. Looking at this noble