The captain, who appeared to be a plain, simple, and somewhat jolly
sort of man, now presented me to his wife, who came from the Austrian
aide of the Save, and spoke German. She seemed, and indeed was, a trim
methodical housewife, as the order of her domestic arrangements
clearly showed. Another female, whom I afterwards learned to be the
wife of an individual of the neighbourhood who was absent, attracted
my attention. Her age was about four and twenty, when the lines of
thinking begin to mingle with those of early youth. In fact, from her
tint I saw that she would soon be _passata_: her features too were by
no means classical or regular, and yet she had unquestionably some of
that super-human charm which Raphael sometimes infused into his female
figures, as in the St. Cecilia. As I repeated and prolonged my gaze,
I felt that I had seen no eyes in Belgrade like those of the beauty of
the Drina, who reminded me of the highest characteristic of
expression--"a spirit scarcely disguised enough in the flesh." The
presence of a traveller from an unknown country seemed to fill her
with delight; and her wonder was childish, as if I had come from some
distant constellation in the firmament.
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