Those colors of complexion and of hair which mark a feminine type
that is distinct from the brunette announce also a different style
of temper and action. Virtue and vice, in these two types of women,
differ in quality and in mode of manifestation. If we construct too
strict a theory upon this difference, it will savor of affectation: a
great many exceptions might spring up to discredit it, and to threaten
its advocate with being called fantastic. He would spend all his time
in lame refutations, and lose the benefit of a moderate statement. We
must be content to observe in general that there are distinctions of
behavior between the blonde and the brunette, which are by no means
cutaneous, but reside deep within the temperament. The superficial
color and the physical structure announce what methods and gestures
we may expect, but do not guarantee that our expectation shall be
invariably fulfilled. Shares of goodness and of faultiness are
impartially distributed to both kinds of women; but subtle differences
of color and movement describe the transactions of their conscience and
their passion.
The poets instinctively build fair-haired and fair-colored women around
deeds which have the flavor of risk and daring; as Tennyson, who
describes Godiva when she is disrobed to ride through Coventry that
she may strip a burdensome tax from her husband's subjects:--
"She shook her head,
And showered the rippled ringlets to her knee;
Unclad herself in haste; adown the stair
Stole on, and, like a creeping sunbeam, slid
From pillar unto pillar."
So the brave and constant Imogen has eyes which are the "blue of
heaven's own tinct;" and the flower that is like her face is the "pale
primrose:" through her complexion the veins show like "the azur'd
harebell."
Dante's forerunner, who is celebrated in Browning's "Sordello," is
beloved by Palma, whose influence continually resists his poetic
day-dreams. He, speculating too finely upon his relation to the
politics of the epoch, and always wondering what way were best for him
to take to benefit men,--through what party, Guelf or Ghibeline, he
might approach his aspirations,--is obliged to turn for manhood and
consistent purpose to Palma:--
"Conspicuous in his world
Of dreams sat Palma. How the tresses curled
Into a sumptuous swell of gold, and wound
About her like a glory! Even the ground
Was bright as with spilt sunbeams."
Julia, in "Two Gentlemen of Verona," iv. 4, hangs jealously over the
picture of Sylvia, her unconscious rival:--
"And yet the painter flatter'd her a little,
Unless I flatter with myself too much.
Her hair is auburn, mine is perfect yellow:
If that be all the difference in his love,
I'll get me such a color'd periwig.
Her eyes are gray as glass; and so are mine:
Ay, but her forehead's low, and mine's as high."
All the light-complexioned women may be classed as blondes, whether the
pure red and white that strive for ascendency be pacified by golden
hair, or whether a more even tint of the cheek find its correspondence
in hair of chestnut hue. There are also women of high vitality,
with gifts never too forthputting because blended into a harmonious
disposition, who contribute still a fresh tone to this chromatic scale;
for their heads wear the crisp aureole of another shade that seems to
invite you, as William Blake, the painter, invited his city friend,
to a "thatched roof of rusted gold." Beneath these roofs we can take
shelter, fearing no catastrophe, unless the rich and winning manners
bring one on. In Bellini's portrait of Cassandra Fedeli,[21] the famous
improvisatrice, whom the Venetians crowned early in the sixteenth
century, this gracious style of woman is preserved.
There is a kind of brunette whose eyes are black as the sloe-berry,
with the pupil and the iris melted together: they are couched
underneath sombre hedges of eyebrows, and silently keep a good
look-out. "The Prince of Darkness is a gentleman:" so can the
princesses of the same color be ladies, but their style may ambush
wickedness enough to task the most adventurous resources of a criminal
lawyer. You will notice, however, that their scheming minds are endowed
with little sprightliness. Intrigue does not put forth a sparkling
surface that is swept by the light thrills of various moods that blow:
the social prattle lacks the tone of charming simplicity and ease. The
face is subject to lowering weather when one of these women meditates
a poisoning: there is one clinch of the teeth as the limbs collect
to make a fatal spring, one glance askant at the person whom she is
diplomatically entertaining with arrangements for his ruin. They cannot
so readily nurse a fell purpose with a melting air of maternity which
transpires in every line of the face and limbs, as the victim is held
cosingly to the fatal breast. He is clutched a little too menacingly,
and has time for a suspicion concerning the nutriment he is about to
draw.
But when blonde women have a talent for mischief, they delicately
distinguish themselves from the brunettes in the style of it. For
downright, unadulterated mischief, let us be commended to the blonde
women of the Indo-Germanic races. And frequently it is merely
organic, with no more premeditation or sense of consciousness than a
stinging-nettle has. They know how to be unaffectedly unscrupulous, as
Miss Rosamond Vincy was in "Middlemarch," with a gay versatility that
is rare in women of a differently-tempered color. Your _riant_ blonde
can drop a bolt from a clear sky, and scatter your long-projected
picnic with sudden misery. As you look up, it is hardly credible:
how or when did the weather change? You almost doubt the evidence of
sense. Darnley must have been blown up by accident. There will always
be two parties relative to any transaction which implicates a blonde
woman, because her resources of demeanor are so ample, she can recur
to them so nimbly, she can meet gathering suspicions with such angelic
refutation in her smile, and the sluice-gates of emotion are so nicely
hung that a touch of taper fingers can let into the scene a freshet of
disclaimer that sweeps your rubbishy doubts away. Not a smut escapes
from the internal simmering to settle upon the snow-white guarantee
of appearance. She reminds us of that adaptation to machines which
exercise a driving-power, by which they are enabled to consume their
own smoke and cinders. Her transparency of skin, and the freshness of
color that spreads up to the temple's whiteness like an after-glow
upon the glacier, lend the proper blush to all her actions. She enjoys
the constant advantage of a face that has the traditional tint of
innocency: when delicate culture and mobile gifts are behind, sportive
moods come out to make a charming din that just drowns the blab of
mischief.
If the poets have assigned good and noble actions to the blonde women
of the imagination, the same function working in legendary lore has
attributed from the most ancient times, and with striking persistency,
mankind's woes to golden beauties. "Lilith, the first wife of Adam,
was a cold, passionless, splendid woman, with wondrous golden hair.
She was created Adam's equal in every respect, therefore properly
enough refused to obey him. For this she was driven from the Garden
of Eden; and Eve was made to order out of one of Adam's ribs. Then
the Golden-haired Lilith, jealous, enraged, pining for her lost home
in Paradise, took the form of a serpent, crept into the garden, and
tempted Adam and Eve to their destruction. And from that day to this,
Lilith, the cold, passionless beauty with golden hair, has roamed up
and down the earth, snaring the sons of Adam and destroying them.
You may always know her dead victims; for, whenever a man has been
destroyed by the hands of Lilith, you will always find a single golden
hair wrapped tight around his lifeless heart."[22]