ions by not forgiving his
misfortunes or his poverty.

If, in spite of this inveterate forgetfulness of the present, Balthazar
Claes had abandoned his mysterious abstractions, if some sweet and
companionable meaning had revisited that thoughtful countenance, if the
fixed eyes had lost their rigid strain and shone with feeling, if he had
ever looked humanly about him and returned to the real life of common
things, it would indeed have been difficult not to do involuntary homage
to the winning beauty of his face and the gracious soul that would then
have shone from it. As it was, all who looked at him regretted that the
man belonged no more to the world at large, and said to one another: "He
must have been very handsome in his youth." A vulgar error! Never was
Balthazar Claes's appearance more poetic than at this moment. Lavater,
had he seen him, would fain have studied that head so full of patience,
of Flemish loyalty, and pure morality,--where all was broad and noble,
and passion seemed calm because it was strong.

The conduct of this man could not be otherwise than pure; his word
was sacred, his friendships seemed undeviating, his self-devotedness
complete: and yet the will to employ those qualities in patriotic
service, for the world or for the family, was directed, fatally,
elsewhere. This citizen, bound to guard the welfare of a household,
to manage property, to guide his children towards a noble future, was
living outside the line of his duty and his affections, in communion
with an attendant spirit. A priest might have thought him inspired by
the word of God; an artist would have hailed him as a great master; an
enthusiast would have taken him for a seer of the Swedenborgian faith.

At the present moment, the dilapidated, uncouth, and ruined clothes that
he wore contrasted strangely with the graceful elegance of the woman who
was sadly admiring him. Deformed persons who have intellect, or nobility
of soul, show an exquisite taste in their apparel. Either they dress
simply, convinced that their charm is wholly moral, or they make others
forget their imperfections by an elegance of detail which diverts the
eye and occupies the mind. Not only did this woman possess a noble soul,
but she loved Balthazar Claes with that instinct of the woman which
gives a foretaste of the communion of angels. Brought up in one of the
most illustrious families of Belgium, she would have learned good taste
had she not possessed it; and