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ZULMIERA, THE HALF-CARIB GIRL.
finest lawn made its appearance above the doublet; and a black-sheathed " Andrèa Ferrara," with basket hilt, dangling from his side, and calf-skin boots, completed his costume. This dress, fitting tight to his shape, shewed to advantage the large but perfect symmetry of his person ; while the dark brown hair, sprinkled here and there with the grey badge of declining years, cropt close around his temples ; and the steeple-crowned hat peculiar to his sect and times, bespoke him, what he was, the friend of Cromwell—the roundhead governor of Antigua. The next person that gained the open ground was Bridget, the beautiful daughter of the governor. If ever there was a personification of extreme loveliness, it was known in Bridget. Scarcely seventeen, her slight but rounded figure, and her sweet, mild face, while it struck the beholder with admiration, and riveted his attention, gave the idea of some embodied sylph. Her complexion was of that ethereal tint of which the poet says— " Oh, call it fair, not pale." •
The lily could scarcely outvie it in purity of colour, although every emanation of her guileless heart called up the latent rose-tint into her delicate cheek ; while the small, pouting 'lip, with all the rich glow of the coral, forbid effectually the supposition of ill health. A slightly aquiline nose, a classically-formed and dimpled chin, with a fair and open forehead, in which every azure vein could be traced, were the prominent features ; blended with that mingled sweetness, that feminine grace, and that inexpressible something, which really and actually constitutes beauty. But her eyes—those soft, lovely eyes—look at them, as she raises the long lashes, and you can fancy, that were her features devoid of any pretensions to comeliness, those liquid orbs would richly compensate for all. Of the clearest hazel, every glance that fell from them spoke the inmost feelings of her soul ; and whether they beamed forth in pity, or flashed with animation, they equally bespoke the benevolence of her nature.