How beautiful his eyes,
That blend the nature of the star
With that of summer skies!
WORDSWORTH.
20. Eyebrows bent like Cupid's bow,
Front an ample field of snow,
Even nose, and cheek withal
Smooth as is the billiard-ball;
Chin as woolly as the peach,
And his lip doth kissing teach,
Till he cherish too much beard
And make Love and you afear'd.
BEN JONSON.
21. A fair and meaning face, an eye of fire,
That checks the bold and makes the free retire.
CRABBE.
22. He has all the graces that render a man's society dear to ladies.
MASSINGER.
23. A beard that would make a razor shake,
Unless its nerves were strong!
ALBERT PIKE.
24. He hath but a little beard, but time will send more if the man
will be thankful.
_As You Like It._
25. A fresh young Squire,
A lover, and a lusty bachelor;
With locks curl'd as they were laid in press:
Of twenty years of age he is, I guess.
CHAUCER.
26. His form is middle size,
Shaped in proportion fair;
And hazel is his eagle eye,
And auburn of the deepest dye
His short curl'd beard and hair.
SCOTT.
27. The tartness of his face sours ripe grapes.
_Coriolanus._
28. A kind true heart, a spirit high,
That cannot fear, and will not bow,
Are written in his manly eye,
And on his manly brow.
HALLECK.
29. He has more goodness in his little finger, than you have in your
whole body;
Indeed he is a personable man, and not a spindle-shanked
hoddy-doddy.
SWIFT.
30. A sweeter and a lovelier gentleman,
Framed in the prodigality of nature,
Young, valiant, wise,
The spacious earth cannot afford again.
_Richard III._
31. A handsome gallant, and a beau of spirit,
Who can go down the dance so well as he?
TENNENT--_Anster Fair_.
32. A phantom, fashionably thin,
With limb of lath, and bearded chin.
SCOTT--_Bridal of Triermain_.
33. There is a fair behavior in him,
And though that nature with a beauteous wall
Doth oft close in pollution, yet of him
I well believe, he has a mind that suits
With this his fair and outward character.
_Two Gentlemen of Verona._
34. Like a crane, his neck is long and fine,
With which he swalloweth up excessive feast.
SPENSER.
35. Oh thy love has an eye
Like a star in the sky,
And breath like the sweets from the hawthorn tree;
And his heart is a treasure,
Whose worth is past measure,
And yet he hath given all--all to thee.
BARRY CORNWALL.
36. His form, his face, his noble mien,
The sweetness of his touching tone,
His feeling heart so simply shown,
Such gifts of mind, such gentle grace,
Proclaim him of no common race.
SOTHEBY.
37. A brow of beautiful yet earnest thought,
A form of manly grace.
MRS. SIGOURNEY.
38. He's handsome, valiant, young,
And looks as he were laid for nature's best,
To catch weak women's eyes.
DRYDEN--_All for Love_.
39. In that fair stand, his forehead, Love still bends
His double bow, and round his arrows sends;
In that tall grove, his hair, those globy rings
He flying curls, and crispeth with his wings.
BEN JONSON.
40. He's fat, and scant o' breath.
_Hamlet._
41. Lordly look'd and lordly limb'd is he,--
A frame of iron, a right arm long and stark,
A rough, loud voice, a visage somedale dark,
A heart which soars as dangers soar, and ne'er
Sinks save in peace.
ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.
42. Tall is his frame, his forehead high,
Still and mysterious is his eye;
His look is like a wintry day
When storms and winds have sunk away.
HOGG--_Queen's Wake_.
43. He chats like popinjay,
And struts with phiz tremendously erect.
TENNENT--_Anster Fair_.
44. His large fair front, and eye sublime, declare
Absolute rule, and hyacinthine locks,
Round from his parted forelock, manly hang
Clustering.
MILTON--_Paradise Lost_.
45. A sweet-faced man; a proper man as one shall see in a summer's
day; a most lovely, gentleman-like man.
_Midsummer Night's Dream._
46. Dark deep eyes, and lips
Whose motions gift the air they breathe with love.
SHELLEY.
47. Full long are both his spindle-shanks, and lean
Just like a walking-stick--no calf is seen.
CHAUCER.
48. Faster than his tongue
Doth make offence, his eye doth heal it up.
_As You Like It._
49. His eyes are like the eagle's, yet sometimes
Liker the dove's; and at his will he wins
All hearts with softness, or with spirit awes.
HOME--_Douglass_.
50. There's a cold bearing,
And grave, severe aspect about the man,
That makes our spirits pay him such respect,
As though he dwelt 'neath age's silvery pent-house,
Despite his unripe years.
FANNY KEMBLE.
51. Young and fair,
Yet a man;--with crisped hair,
Cast in thousand snares and rings
For Love's fingers, and his wings:
Chesnut color, or more slack
Gold, upon a ground of black.
BEN JONSON.
52. A brow half martial, and half diplomatic,
An eye upsoaring like an eagle's wings.
HALLECK.
53. He capers, he dances, he has eyes of youth;
He writes verses, he speaks holiday,
He smells April and May.
_Merry Wives of Windsor._
54. 'Tis not his talent to conceal his thoughts,
And carry smiles and sunshine in his face,
When discontent sits heavy at his heart.
ADDISON--_Cato_.
55. A fop complete,
He stalks the jest and glory of the street.
CRABBE.
56. Oh what a grace is seated on his brow!
A combination and a form indeed,
Where every god doth seem to set his seal
To give the world assurance of a man.
_Hamlet._
57. Such beauty as great strength thinks no disgrace,
Smiles in the manly features of his face;
His large black eyes, fill'd with a spriteful light,
Shoot forth such lively and illustrious night,
As the sunbeams on jet reflecting show;
His hair is black, in short curl'd waves doth flow;
His tall, straight body amid thousands stands,
Like some fair pine o'erlooking all the lands.
COWLEY--_Davideis_.
58. He witches the world with noble horsemanship,
And vaults into his saddle with such ease,
As if an angel dropt down from the clouds
To turn and wind a fiery Pegasus.
_Henry IV._
59. A stalwart, active, soldier-looking stripling,
Handsome as Hercules ere his first labor,
And with a brow of thought beyond his years
When in repose, till his eye kindles up,
In answering yours.
BYRON--_Werner_.
60. His face is dark, but very quiet;
It seems like looking down the dusky mouth
Of a great cannon.
JOHN STERLING--_Strafford_.
WHAT IS THE CHARACTER OF YOUR LADY-LOVE?
Look at her, whoe'er
Thou be that kindlest with a Poet's soul
Intensely----from imagination take
The treasure; what mine eyes behold see thou,
Even though the Atlantic Ocean roll between.
WORDSWORTH.
The idea of her life shall sweetly creep
Into his study of imagination;
And every lovely organ of her life,
Shall come apparell'd in more precious habit,
More moving, delicate, and full of life,
Into the eye and prospect of his soul.
_Much Ado About Nothing._
WHAT IS THE CHARACTER OF YOUR LADY-LOVE?
1. Her body's matchless form
Is better'd by the pureness of her mind.
MASSINGER.
2. She's made of those rare elements that now and then appear,
As if removed by accident into a lesser sphere,
Forever reaching up and on to life's sublimer things,
As if they had been used to track the universe with wings.
WILLIS.
3. This reasoning maid, above her sex's dread,
Has dared to read, and dares to say she read.
CRABBE.
4. Her smile so soft, her heart so kind,
Her voice for pity's tones so fit,
All speak her woman;--but her mind
Lifts her where bards and sages sit.
DR. BROWN.
5. A perfect woman, nobly plann'd,
To warn, to comfort, and command,
And yet a spirit still, and bright
With something of an angel light.
WORDSWORTH.
6. One whose life is like a star,
Without toil or rest to mar
Its divinest harmony,
Its God-given serenity.
JAMES ALDRICH.
7. She is wise, if I can judge of her,
And fair she is, if that mine eyes be true,
And true she is, as she hath proved herself.
_Merchant of Venice._
8. Right from the hand of God her spirit came
Unstain'd, and she hath ne'er forgotten whence
It came, nor wander'd far from thence,
But laboreth to keep her still the same,
Near to her place of birth, that she may not
Soil her white raiment with an earthly spot.
J. R. LOWELL.
9. With her mien she enamors the brave,
With her wit she engages the free,
With her modesty pleases the grave;
She is every way pleasing to thee.
SHENSTONE.
10. I would my horse had the speed of her tongue.
_Much Ado About Nothing._
11. As through the hedge-row shade the violet steals,
And the sweet air its modest leaf reveals,
Her softer charms, but by their influence known,
Surprise all hearts, and mould them to her own.
ROGERS.
12. Full many a lady
You have eyed with best regard, and many a time,
The harmony of their tongues hath into bondage
Brought your too diligent ear; for several virtues
You have liked several women; never any
With so full soul, but some defect in her
Did quarrel with the noblest grace she owed,
And put it to the foil: But she, O she,
So perfect and so peerless, is created
Of every creature's best!
_Tempest._
13. She is all simplicity,
A creature soft and mild;
Though on the eve of womanhood,
In heart a very child.
MRS. WELBY.
14. Who does not understand and love her,
With feeling thus o'erfraught?
Though silent as the sky above her,
Like that, she kindles thought.
DR. GILMAN.
15. Sacred and sweet is all I see in her.
_Taming of the Shrew._
16. She is
Happy in all endowments, which a poet
Could fancy in his mistress; being herself
A school of goodness, where chaste maids may learn,
By the example of her life and pureness,
To be, as she is, excellent.
MASSINGER.
17. She steps like some glad creature of the air,
As if she read her fate and knew it fair;
In truth, for fate at all she hath no care.
Yet hath she tears as well as gladness;
A butterfly in pain
Will make her weep for very sadness,
But straight she'll smile again.
A. M. WELLS.
18. A maiden never bold
Of spirit, so still and quiet, that her motion
Blush'd at itself.
_Othello._
19. She saith not once _nay_ when thou sayest _yea_;
"Do this," saith he. "All ready, sir," saith she.
CHAUCER.
20. Every thought and feeling throw
Their shadows o'er her face,
And so are every thought and feeling join'd,
'Twere hard to answer whether heart or mind
Of either were the native place.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON.
21. She speaks,
Yet she says nothing!
_Romeo and Juliet._
22. She will weep for nothing, like Diana in the fountain, when thou
art disposed to be merry; and will laugh like a hyena, when thou
art disposed to sleep.
_As You Like It._
23. Though on pleasure she is bent,
She has a frugal mind.
GOLDSMITH.
24. Happy in this, she is not yet so old
But she may learn; happier than this,
She is not bred so dull but she can learn:
Happiest of all is, that her gentle spirit
Commits itself to yours to be directed.
_Merchant of Venice._
25. Mind is her best gift, and poetry her world;
And she will see strange beauty in a flower,
As by a subtle vision.
WILLIS.
26. A being of sudden smiles and tears,
Passionate visions, quick light and shade.
HEMANS.
27. Little she speaks, but dear attentions
From her will ceaseless rise;
She checks our wants with kind preventions,
And lulls the children's cries.
DR. GILMAN.
28. Oh when she's angry, she is keen and shrewd!
She was a vixen when she went to school,
And though she be but little, she is fierce.
_Midsummer Night's Dream._
29. Graceful and useful all she does,
Blessing and blest where'er she goes.
COWPER.
30. She has an earnest intellect, a perfect thirst of mind,
A heart by elevated thoughts and poetry refined.
WILLIS.
31. A timid grace sits trembling in her eye,
Speaking most plain the thoughts which do possess
Her gentle sprite,--peace, and meek quietness,
And innocent love, and maiden purity.
CHARLES LAMB.
32. She hath more hair than wit,
More faults than hairs,
And more wealth than faults.
_Two Gentlemen of Verona._
33. Her soul is more than half divine,
Where, through some shades of earthly feeling,
Religion's soften'd glories shine,
Like light through summer foliage stealing.
MOORE.
34. She will turn from a love-breathing seraph away,
If he come not apparell'd in purple and gold.
MRS. OSGOOD.
35. She sways her house, commands her followers,
Takes and gives back affairs and their despatch,
With a most smooth, discreet, and stable bearing.
_Twelfth Night._
36. Spring hath no blossom fairer than her form,
Winter no snow-wreath purer than her mind.
The dew-drop trembling to the summer sun
Is like her smile; bright, transient, heaven-refined.
MRS. PIERSON.
37. She is a lady of confirmed honor, of an unmatchable
spirit, and determinate in all virtuous resolutions;
not hasty to anticipate an affront, nor slow
to feel where just provocation is given.
CHARLES LAMB.
38. Her outward charms are less
Than her winning gentleness;
With maiden purity of heart,
Which, without the aid of art,
Does in coldest hearts inspire
Love.
JAMES ALDRICH.
39. She dwells among us like a star,
That from its bower of bliss
Looks down, yet gathers not a stain
From aught it sees in this.
MRS. WELBY.
40. She in pleasant purpose doth abound,
And greatly joyeth merry tales to feign.
SPENSER.
41. Early and late, at her soul's gate,
Sits Chastity in warder wise;
No thought unchallenged, small or great,
Goes thence into her eyes;
Nor may a low, unworthy thought
Beyond that virgin warder win,
Nor one, whose password is not "ought,"
May go without, or enter in.
J. R. LOWELL.
42. A light, busy foot astir
In her small housewifery, the blithest bee
That ever wrought in hive.
MITFORD.
43. Practised to lisp and hang the head aside,
Faint into airs, and languish into pride.
POPE.
44. She is ever fair, and never proud,
Hath tongue at will, and yet is never loud.
_Othello._
45. I call her richly blest,
In the calm meekness of her woman's breast,
Where that sweet depth of still contentment lies;
And for her household love, which clings
Unto all ancient and familiar things,
Weaving from each some link for home's dear charities.
HEMANS.
46. She's peevish, sullen, froward,
Proud, disobedient, stubborn, lacking duty.
_Two Gentlemen of Verona._
47. No simplest duty is forgot;
Life hath no dim and lowly spot
That doth not in her sunshine share.
J. R. LOWELL.
48. Disdain and scorn ride sparkling in her eyes,
Misprizing what they look on;--and her wit
Values itself so highly, that to her
All matter else seems weak.
_Much Ado About Nothing._
49. With despatchful looks
She turns, on hospitable thoughts intent,
What choice to choose for delicacy best,
What order so contrived as not to mix
Tastes not well join'd, inelegant, but bring
Taste after taste upheld with kindliest change.
MILTON.
50. None so gay as she;
Up hill and down, morning, and noon, and night,
Singing or talking; singing to herself
When none give ear.
ROGERS--_Italy._
51. The green
And growing leaves of seventeen
Are round her;--and half hid, half seen,
A violet flower;
Nursed by the virtues she hath been
From childhood's hour.
HALLECK.
52. Blest with temper whose unclouded ray
Can make to-morrow cheerful as to-day:
Spleen, vapors, or small-pox, above them all,
And mistress of herself though china fall.
POPE--_Characters of Women._
53. Seldom she speaks, but she will listen
With all the signs of soul;
Her cheek will change, her eye will glisten,
As waves of feeling roll.
DR. GILMAN.
54. She bears a purse; she is a region in Guiana, all gold and bounty.
_Merry Wives of Windsor._
55. You are as rich in having such a jewel,
As twenty seas, if all their sands were pearl,
The water nectar, and the rocks pure gold.
_Two Gentlemen of Verona._
56. Oh, she is a golden girl,
But a man--a _man_ should woo her!
They who seek her shrink aback,
When they should like storms pursue her.
BARRY CORNWALL.
57. She is soft as the dew-drops that fall
From the lip of the sweet-scented pea;
Perhaps when she smiled upon all,
Thou hast thought that she smiled upon thee.
MACKENZIE--_Man of Feeling._
58. She is the cause of six matches being broken off, and three sons
disinherited.
SHERIDAN.
59. All her strain
Is of domestic gladness, fire-side bliss,
And household rule; nor thought loose, light, or vain,
Stains her pure vision of meek happiness.
ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.
60. She loves, but 'tis not you she loves,
Not you on whom she ponders,
When in some dream of tenderness
Her truant fancy wanders.
The forms that flit her vision through,
Are like the shapes of old,
Where tales of Prince and Paladin
On tapestry are told.
Man may not hope her heart to win,
Be his of common mould.
C. F. HOFFMAN.
WHAT IS THE CHARACTER OF HIM WHO LOVES YOU?
Something that may serve to set in view
The doings, observations which his mind
Had dealt with--I will here record in verse.
WORDSWORTH.
WHAT IS THE CHARACTER OF HIM WHO LOVES YOU?
1. Of manners gentle, of affections mild,
In wit a man, simplicity a child.
POPE.
2. He has a shrewd wit, I can tell you;
and he's a man good enough; he's one of the
soundest judgments, and a proper man of person.
_Troilus and Cressida._
3. Love, fame, and glory, with alternate sway
Thrill his warm heart, and with electric ray
Illume his eye; yet still a shade of care,
Like a light cloud that floats in summer air,
Will shed at times a transitory gloom,
But shadow not one grace of manly bloom.
MRS. K. WARE.
4. He wounds no breast with jeer and jest, yet bears no honey'd
tongue,
He's social with the gray-hair'd one, and merry with the young.
ELIZA COOK.
5. A shallow brain behind a serious mask,
An oracle within an empty cask;
He says but little, and that little said
Owes all its weight, like loaded dice, to lead.
COWPER--_Conversation._
6. Fearless he is, and scorning all disguise;
What he dares do, or think, though men may start,
He speaks with mild, yet unaverted eyes.
SHELLEY.
7. A lofty spirit his, and somewhat proud;
Little gallant, and has a sort of cloud
Hanging forever on his cold address.
LEIGH HUNT--_Rimini._
8. He writes brave verses, speaks brave words,
Swears brave oaths, and breaks them as bravely
_As You Like It._
9. In truth he is a strange and wayward wight,
Fond of each gentle and each dreadful scene;
In darkness and in storm he finds delight,
Nor less than when on ocean's wave serene
The southern sun displays his dazzling sheen.
BEATTIE--_Minstrel._
10. There is in him so much man, so much goodness,
So much of honor, and of all things else
Which make our being excellent, that from his store
He can enough lend others.
MASSINGER.
11. He draweth out the staple of his verbosity finer than the staple
of his argument.
_Love's Labour Lost._
12. His words are strong, but not with anger fraught,
A lore benignant he hath lived and taught;
To draw mankind to heaven by gentleness
And good example is his business.
CHAUCER.
13. The monarch-mind, the mystery of commanding,
The god-like power, the art Napoleon
Of winning, fettering, moulding, wielding, banding
The hearts of millions, till they move as one.
HALLECK.
14. Devout, yet cheerful; pious, not austere;
To others lenient, to himself severe.
DR. HARVEY.
15. With scrupulous care exact, he walks the rounds
Of fashionable duty; laughs when sad,
When merry weeps, deceiving is deceived,
And flattering, flatter'd.
POLLOK.
16. A fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy.
_Hamlet._
17. Erect, morose, determined, solemn, slow;
Who knows the man can never cease to know.
CRABBE.
18. Rare compound of oddity, frolic, and fun,
To relish a joke, and rejoice in a pun!
GOLDSMITH.
19. He is a man
Among a thousand. Unassuming, he
May yet assume unquestion'd. Gentleness,
And a strange strength, a calm o'erruling strength,
Are mix'd within him so, that neither take
Possession from the other,--neither rise
In mastery or passion, but both grow
Harmoniously together.
W. G. SIMMS.
20. For beauty and fortin' the laddie's been courtin',
Weel featured, weel tochered, weel mounted and braw!
BURNS.
21. He will pick a quarrel for a straw,
And fight it out to the extremity.
CHARLES LAMB.
22. He cannot flatter and speak fair,
Smile in men's faces, smooth, deceive, and coy,
Duck with French nods, and apish courtesy.
_Richard III._
23. A primrose by the river's brim
A yellow primrose is to him,
And it is nothing more.
WORDSWORTH.
24. His young bosom feels the enchantment strong
Of light, and joy, and minstrelsy and song.
PIERPONT--_Airs of Palestine._
25. If he has any faults he leaves us in doubt,
At least in six weeks we can't find them out.
GOLDSMITH.
26. The friend of man, the friend of truth,
The friend of age, the guide of youth;
Few hearts like his with virtue warm'd,
Few heads with knowledge so inform'd.
BURNS.
27. If his body were opened, and you find so much
blood in his liver as will clog the foot of a flea,
I'll eat the rest of his anatomy.
_Two Gentlemen of Verona._
28. He hums and he hankers, he frets and he cankers,
You never can please him, do a' that you can;
He's peevish and jealous of a' the young fellows.
BURNS.
29. An ample soul,
Rockbound and fortified against assaults
Of transitory passion, but below
Built on a surging, subterraneous fire,
That stirs and lifts him up to high attempts.
TAYLOR.
30. His very manners teach to amend,
They are so even, grave and holy;
No stubbornness so stiff, nor folly
To license ever was so light,
As twice to trespass in his sight;
His look would so correct it when
It chid the vice, yet not the men.
BEN JONSON.
31. He thinks,
That he who fights and runs away
May live to fight another day.
BUTLER--_Hudibras._
32. He keeps his honesty and truth,
His independent tongue and pen,
And moves in manhood, as in youth,
Pride of his fellow-men.
HALLECK.
33. His life doth flow
From its mysterious urn a sacred stream,
In whose calm depth the beautiful and pure
Alone are mirror'd; which, though shapes of ill
May hover round its surface, glides in light,
And takes no shadow from them.
TALFOURD--_Ion._
34. He is too costly for every day,
You would want another for working days.
_Much Ado About Nothing._
35. Strange, that his nobly fashion'd mould,
In which a very god might dwell,
Should only live to dig for gold,
And perish in its narrow cell!
BOWRING.
36. He has no party rage, no sectary's whim;
Christian and countryman is all with him.
CRABBE.
37. Valiant he as fire,
Showing danger more than ire.
Bounteous as the clouds to earth,
And as honest as his birth;
All his actions they are such
As to do no thing too much;
Nor o'erpraise, nor yet condemn,
Nor outvalue, nor contemn,
Nor do wrongs nor wrongs receive,
Nor tie knots, nor knots unweave.
From all baseness to be free,
As he durst love truth and thee.
BEN JONSON.
38. He snuffs far off the anticipated joy,
Turtle and venison all his thoughts employ.
COWPER.
39. In his strength
The mighty oak has likeness; gentleness
In him is like the rosy parasite,
The flush Spring gives it wrapping it around
With sweetest color and adorning grace.
His soul, refined beyond the rustic world,
Has yet no city vices. He has kept
Its whiteness unprofaned.
W. G. SIMMS.
40. He'll never learn his bark to steer
'Mid passion's sudden, wild career,
Nor try at times to tack and veer
To interest's gale,
But hoist the sheet, unawed by fear
Though storms prevail.
HECTOR MACNEIL.
41. A fair example of his own pure creed,
Patient of error, pitiful to need,
Persuasive wisdom in his thoughtful mien.
MRS. SIGOURNEY.
42. One of that stubborn sort he is,
Who if they once grow fond of an opinion,
They call it honor, honesty, and faith,
And sooner part with life than let it go.
ROWE--_Jane Shore._
43. Virtue's his path, but sometimes 'tis too narrow
For his vast soul, and then he starts wide out,
And bounds into a vice that bears him far
From his first course, and plunges him in ills.
DRYDEN--_All for Love._
44. A man whom storms can never make
Meanly complain, nor can a flattering gale
Make him talk proudly.
DR. WATTS.
45. He'll prattle shrewdly with such witty folly,
As almost betters reason.
JOHN HOWARD PAYNE.
46. Heed not, though at times he seem
Dark and still, and cold as clay;
He is shadow'd by his dream,
But 'twill pass away.
BARRY CORNWALL.
47. He quick is anger'd, and as quick
His short-lived passion's over-past,
Like summer lightnings, flashing thick,
But flying ere a bolt is cast.
E. D. GRIFFIN.
48. Oh, he's as tedious
As a tired horse, a railing wife,
Worse than a smoky house.
_Henry IV._
49. Love, the germ
Of his mild nature, hath spread graces forth,
Expanding with its progress; as the store
Of rainbow color, which the seed conceals,
Sheds out its tints from its dim treasury
To flush and circle in the flower.
TALFOURD--_Ion._
50. He is----but what need I say that or this,
I'd spend a month to tell ye what he is!
RAMSAY--_Gentle Shepherd._