Huberts Wife | Page 5

years ago--and now!
As we look through Duncan's eyes, we see that Della was the taller and
more graceful of the two. Her hair and complexion were rather dark
than fair; long, dark eyelashes shaded eyes deep blue, dreamy and
wondrous in expression. We never mind much a nose, unless it be ugly
to a deformity, or a model for the sculptor. An Angelo would have
thrilled at sight of Della's nose, and straightway wrought it into
immortality, alto relievo. Her mouth and chin were as lovely and
divinely rounded as any Madonna's. The shape of her head was superb;
and she wore her hair, which was truly a glory in itself, somewhat like
a crown, which left her finely curved ear liberty to show itself and to
hear everything that was going on. Many would have rhapsodised over
her lithe, slender form. Not we. More admirable that faithful approach
to those olden models of the human form that exist in artists' studios
and adorn grand rooms of princely connoisseurs.
Nature is everywhere lovely. Had the ancient Greeks chiselled but the
wasp waists of our modern belles, their hideous works would have sunk
into oblivion in as little time as our self-made martyrs drop into early
graves.
Not saying that Della Lisle, whose waist you could not "span with your
two hands," had foolishly contributed to make less its natural size, but

it was painfully suggestive of weakened lungs and an early translation.
Ellice, on the contrary, possessed a low, plump figure, all curve and
dimple, with no appearance of angularity or stiffness. She had a fair,
round face, cheeks in which roses came and went, laughing blue eyes, a
wide, low brow, auburn curls, nose not retroussé, but the least bit
inclined that way, white teeth, somewhat large, but pretty, that really
did look like pearls between such cherry-red lips.
You might stand in respect and admiration before the dignified and
intellectual Della Lisle; but Ellice Linwood you would take to your
heart. If you were gay, she would laugh with you; if serious, she would
become pensive; if sick, she would soothe and comfort you.
She was the most unselfish creature in existence. Self-denial ceased to
become such to her; her happiness was in yours alone.
All things about the plantation brightened in presence of these two
young maidens. Old servants grew more youthful, the young wiser and
happier, and all, from black to brown, from young to old, as they
looked upon the bright face of the northern stranger, turned dreamer
and prophet. And this is what they dreamed and wished and foretold:
that Master Duncan would make Ellice his wife and keep her forever.
And Duncan? Well, while such a spirit of prophecy reigned all around
him, it is not to be supposed that it fell not on him also. He thought no
more of seeking from his wise sister the solution of his antipathy to
Miss Thornton. There was no room in his mind now for aught outside
his home.
In three weeks he asked Ellice to be his wife. The same day he
dispatched a letter to the Principal of the Troy Ladies' Seminary,
soliciting a teacher for Colonel Anderson; another message, also, to the
father of his affianced, begging him to come down at once and perform
the marriage ceremony for his daughter.
This was doing up business very expeditiously. Of course it was soon
noised near and far, that great quantities of snow-white cake were being

made at Kennons kitchen. Servants would talk; little pitchers had ears,
and birds carried news.
Miss Thornton went in state to call upon the strangers. She saw at a
glance how matters stood, or were going to stand. She could have torn
out Ellice's happy heart. As it was, she bowed to all haughtily as a
queen, casting her last contemptuous glance at Miss Linwood's face.
Miss Thornton ordered to be driven rapidly homeward; and, as she was
whirled along, her thoughts, in a swifter whirl, she meditated and
resolved.
Before the bewildered clergyman could make his way down from the
North, before the goddess of Rumor herself had even suspected such a
thing, Miss Thornton's whole retinue of suitors, and the people at large
were electrified by the astounding intelligence that Mr. Harris, from
Flat Rock, had been summoned to Thornton Hall to unite in marriage
its beautiful mistress, Miss Jerusha Thornton, to Doctor Jude Rush!
Dr. Jude Rush had the year previously emigrated to Mecklenburg
county from the State of Maine. There was about him nothing so
extraordinary as to require particular description. He was an ordinary
country doctor, about thirty in years, had sandy hair, was sandy
complexioned, and wore sandy clothes. This is not much to our taste,
but then we did not marry