Cincinnati daily press. [volume] (Cincinnati [Ohio]) 1860-1862, 1860-10-30

Poetic Feet tCOns1dered outside ot PfOsOdy,
A recent writer on the feet has this chap
ter: l .... ..
We do not like foot too small for the
hight any more than we like one too large
A small foot indicateth coquetry. Cleopa-
trs's foot must have been small and finely
arched, or she would never have done as de-
scribed by Enobarbus
"I saw heronce
Hop forty PAGES through the public street"
No woman ever did or would have done
the like, but with the consciousness of great
perfection in the feet.
Antony sends her pearls, saying:
''Tbe firm Roman to great Egypt sends
This treasure Of an oyster; at whose feet,
Her opuient throne With Kingdoms.
No man alludes to a woman's foot in any
way, if he loves her, unless it be beautiful.
Hermione, on the contrary, had q firm,
well-proportioned foot, betokening majesty
When she enacts the statue scene, we are
sure she had a well-sized foot:
'Oh royal piece,
There's magic in thy majesty"
is the exclamation of Leontes.
A woman will never enact the part of a
statue, if conscious of an i'll foot, unless her
intellectually may have perverted her in-
stincts, as in the case of Madame de Stael,
who at one time personated in this way and
Talleyrand, if we mistake not, offended her,
past retrieve, by saying he knew who it was
by the pied de Staet (pedestall a terrible pun
where the feet and ankles are ill-shaped.
Desdemona, Ophelia and Cordelia must
have bad long, slender feet, which agree
rather with sentiment than with magnetism
or genius. Miranda, on the contrary, had
elegantly -proportioned feet, worthy the
chaste Diana herself Then, too, Kate,
dainty Kate, the sharp shrew, the pretty
utx ho1 hod Il
elastic as the spring of tigers. When
Petruchio says:
"Why does the world report that Kate doth limp"
it was delicate commentator of her foot;
still more when he says,
SDid ever Dian so become q grove
As Kate this chamber with her prinoely gait 2"
Tennyson hath delicate eye for a foot
when be represents Ida in this wise:
H "She stood
Among her madens, higher By the head,
M heE & back aga against pillar her to9t to, on one
And paved about her SANDAL
And again, describing the retinue of the
princess climbing the rock in pursuit of min
erals he says;
"MaHy M light ., foot shOne like jewel set
Women with large feet never like to climb
hills.
The sentiment of beauty is less in the size
than acertain litheness and elasticity. "Light
as fawn," "Fleet as the greyhound" /" 'With
a step like stag" are all pretty phrases,
Indicating the character of the foot, which
is the index to the whole woman. -. ..
Dress has great effect upon the foot, and
we fear very long dresses demoralize it. The
long robe certainly destroys its elasticity,
We like TO see womans feet
"Beneath her petticoat,
AS if they feared the light"
mi -
his mistress bathing her feet in brook, and
wrote her,
''Do not fear to put thy feet,
Naked In the water sweet
Fear not lizard, newt or toad,
Will dare to come where thou hast tiod"
The French foot is meagre, narrow and
bony; the Spanish foot is small and elegantly
curved, thanks to its Moorish blood, corre-
spending with the Castilian pride-"high in
the instep." The Arab foot is proverbial for
its high arch; "a stream can run under the
hollow of his foot" is description of its
form. The foot OF the Scotch is large and
thick-that of the Irish fiat and square-the
English short and feshy. The American
foot is apt to be disproportionately small.
A foot should be arched, fairly rounded
a1d its length proportioned to the hight of
the individual. It should have a delicate
spring to it, as if it did not quite belong to
the earth, and tcuchiug it daintily, if not
disdainfully. The ankle should express ten
derness, should be round and firm, and not
too small. ~
Il have hurt the wrist Of my foot, said
beautiful child, who never misplaced a
phrase, because words were given him only
as he stood in need of them. Now this
pretty phrase, wrist of my foot" conveys
the true idea of an ankle. 1t should have
the grace and Aexibility of the wrist to
which ii corresponds.
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