It was related with fluency, plausibility, and gravity;
and it was accompanied with a manner seemingly artless and humane, which
it was scarcely possible for one unhackneyed in the stratagems of deceit
to distrust and contradict.
"Surely," replied Edwin, "I cannot be wholly mistaken. At least has
there not a young shepherdess just arrived here, tall, tender and
beautiful, and whose flaxen tresses are more bright than gold, and more
abundant than the blossoms in the spring?"
Before the officious domestic could reply to his enquiries, two of the
nymphs, who had been attired for the feast of Imogen, came into the
outer apartment in which the shepherd was, and advanced toward him.
"These are my mistresses," cried the attendant. Edwin approached them
with respect, and repeated his former enquiries. They were the most
beautiful of the train of Roderic. They were clad in garments of the
whitest silk, and profusely adorned with chaplets of flowers. Their
appearance therefore was calculated to give them, in a shepherd's eye,
an air of sweetness and simplicity that could not easily be resisted.
One of them was tall and majestic, and the other low, and of a shape and
figure the most alluring. This appeared to be like a blossom in May,
whose colours discovered to the attentive observer all their
attractions, without being expanded to the careless eye: And that might
be supposed to be a few summers farther advanced to a delicious
maturity.
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