She lived in a country house where I had been several times a guest, and she had one of those faces which, in Gray's beautiful expression, speak the language of all nations. Her features had that sunny charm which thaws mistrust; she was dowered with all graces and sweet qualities; and you could no more have doubted the immanent nobility of her nature than you could have dreamed a stain in the texture of a white petal. And with all her gentleness there was present I know not what sign and promise of strength, waking in those who saw her an intuitive trust in loyalty of uttermost proof. She would have flamed indignant against evil, but only evil could have moved her from that equal poise of soul which made her entrance into a room the prelude to higher thoughts and finer feelings. She was naturally kind without consciousness of a mission, neither seeking to enslave nor enfranchise, but by a silent outflowing of goodness ennobling whatever company she was in. Nor was her tongue the prattling servant of her beauty, but a guide of cheerful converse; for just as she charmed without device or scheme of fascination, so she possessed the art of speaking well without seeming to have ever studied it. In the chase after just and felicitous ideas, she could lead or follow over the most varied fields with the intuition of the huntress born. With all these excellences, her wit, her sincerity, her ardour for all things bright and true, she had no conceit of herself but kept her father's house in gladness and loved the country-side.
To her, in these days of imminent dismay, my thoughts flew out as to a fair protecting saint; until the inspiration of her visionary presence wrought in my fancy with such a dramaturgic power, that I seemed to walk daily with her, and to know all those delicate and sweet propinquities by which liking passes into affection and affection is glorified into love. So far did these happy day-dreams carry me, that they brought me to the extreme of imaginary bliss, and poured out for me the wine of untempered joy which thrills the hearts of lovers on the verge of their betrothal. The dreams that followed that magic draught denied me no convincing touch of circumstance, and projected upon a credible and familiar scene the bright possibilities to which fate denied a real existence. The scene was always the same, and the words and movements which entranced me followed each other with almost religious exactitude of detail which the adult demands of his day-dreams and the child of the fairy-tale he loves.