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GREEK FEMALE BEAUTY.

THE picture, from which the present print has been engraved, was exhibited three years ago, in the gallery of the British Institution, as an ideal portrait of Lord Byron's Gulnare. There are, however, discrepancies both of feature and countenance between the two portraits, which entirely forbid any such identification. The character of Gulnare, in the "Corsair," is that of a woman whose external appearance denotes a calm gentle spirit, prone to affection, grateful, and confiding; but inwardly swayed by sudden impulses, and therefore liable, in untoward circumstances, to sink into the instrument of the worst passions. The moment she bestows her heart, like La Esmeralda in the "Hunchback of Notre Dame," on her casual deliverer, adieu to all ties, both human and divine! Even the sacred engagement of bread and salt, respected in her country by the worst robbers, by Conrad himself, has no power over her. This may, perhaps, in certain positions, be natural; but, admitting the existence of such a character, it would be necessary, in endeavouring to clothe the spirit with a suitable exterior, to make choice of a very peculiar assemblage of features. Regular, and apparently tranquil, they might be: but in the lip and eye there should be a lurking expression of pride, not open and noble,

as becomes the countenance of the free, but veiled, and thrown by affected meekness and humility into the shade. Indeed, all the muscles of the face should exhibit the coolness and immobility of a mask, as they do in the harem slave, schooled by terror into a show of gentleness: yet, through all this placidity, we should be able to detect slight traces of fierceness, and that restlessness, indicative of revenge deferred the frozen unjoyous smile, the cheek prematurely faded, and the whole visage lighted up by a species of sepulchral brightness.

But, if Mr. Hollins's creation be not Gulnare, it is something better. The artist has studied in Greece, that great nursery of female beauty, and here brings before the eye one of those superb faces, which, though not peculiar to the Greek race, are more commonly found among them than any other nation. It is no longer the beauty of classic times, in proportion, symmetry, and harmony of features, bordering on ideal perfection. Faithful to nature, he has preserved, in his picture, the changes which time, and the mixture of barbarian blood, have effected in the descendants of that people of unrivalled organisation. The forehead rises less perpendicularly there is a slight angularity in the cheek - in the upper part of the nose there is somewhat too little breadth -in the lower part too much: between the eyebrows also,which, in the beauty of antiquity, nearly met,—a considerable interval is perceptible; and this, though it imparts a more sunny aspect to the countenance, detracts, in some measure, from the air of severe loveliness which would result from the contrary arrangement. But the eyes, large, liquid, and dark; the small mouth, not smiling, but redolent of smiles; and the rich oval chin, in which we scarcely miss the dimpled mark of Love's finger; all these belong to the race

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of which beauty was the most prominent national characteristic.

Rarely do we find, in any part of Greece, an example of beauty in strict accordance with the classical model. Even among the Moreot girls, in the unfrequented mountains of Messenia, traces of intermarriage with the barbarian are discoverable; but these peculiarities, being linked, in all persons of Gothic race, with early cherished associations, constitute, what hasty or insufficient judges appear to consider something more beautiful than beauty itself. To the same cause must be traced the error, so common in those who treat incidentally on the loveliness of womanhood, of imagining some fanciful irregularity of features preferable to exact symmetry and proportion: not perceiving that beauty can never gain by the absence of one of its principal elements. For persons of so imperfect a taste, however, the modifications wrought by accident, in the original Greek type of perfection, possess superior attractions; but, to the artist, ambitious of impregnating his mind with ideas of genuine beauty, these marks of deterioration in the physical structure yield only disappointment and pain.

In Candia, and generally wherever the Greek population has been degraded by intermarriage with foreigners, a corresponding declension from the original standard of beauty may be perceived. Several characteristics of the pure race immediately grow less prominent. Instead of that exquisite oval outline, observable in the visages of the ancient statues, we discover a certain squareness and angularity, not unlike the distinguishing traits of the Mongols; and, in the course of a few generations, every mark of classic origin wholly disappears. The barbarians, it is true, seem, in many cases, to gain what the Greek loses; for, at present, many Turkish families, instead of the coarse Tartar features which their

ancestors brought along with them from the banks of the Amoor, exhibit almost every peculiarity of the Grecian countenance, but the soul by which it was animated.

In the genuine Greek face, indeed, nothing is so remarkable as its intellectuality; which, in the successive stages of its debasement, until it is wholly merged in the coarse features of the barbarian, is the last sign of its noble origin which it loses. And, in the women of Greece, this trait still constitutes the most powerful attraction. They are soft, gentle, pliable, but not weak. Their impassioned character, fraught with the elements of every thing great in human nature, harmonised, however, by the spirit of womanhood, generally preserves them from contempt or neglect. Wherever they are beloved, they rule; not by those petty arts, which sometimes render the feeble an overmatch for the strong, but by the natural ascendency of enthusiasm. Education, if properly adapted to the female constitution of mind, would, no doubt, enhance their value, and give to their powers a more resistless influence. But, even when their mental resources are not rendered available, they possess a vivacity and earnestness seldom found in the women of the North. You could commune with them for ever. Far less than ourselves the slaves of conventional prejudices, they unravel with marvellous facility the tangled web of character, and confide most unboundedly where they see good ground for confidence. Their imaginations, gifted with a plastic power akin to that of poetry, if not identical, enrich even the most trivial conversation with novel and sparkling images—all feminine, all dipped in the fountain of beauty, all distinguished for that grace and delicacy, which of right belong to the language of woman. Less the slave of sense, but more of passion, even than the stronger sex, they are constant and unswerving in love or hate.

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