Waterbury evening Democrat., 1890-01-21
TIE EYES OF GENIUS,
How tho Orbs of the Poets Have An,
 peared t1 Observers.

How tho Orbs of the Poets Have Alp.
 peared t1 Observers.
 Emerson used t., say that each man carried in his eye she exact indication or his rank in the immense scale of men, Another close observer of human nature asserts that persons with prominent eyes are found to have great command oi words and to be ready speakers and writer's. A 'hird holds the theory that :he prevails 1g color of the eyes of men of genius ia gray.
 Colonel Hlgginson speaks of Nathaniel hawthorne's gray eyes," while F. II. Underwood, ''who once studied them att tentively, found them mottled gray and brown and indescribab soft and win ming" Elsewhere we find it asserted that mo finer eyes had appeared in the literary circle of Great Britain since Burns time than those of Hawthorne"
 David Gray's were large and lus- trous," and Dante Rossetti's ''gray-blue clear and piercing, and charac cterized by that rapid, penetrating gaze so notice able in Emerson
 Shelley's eyes are always spoken of as magnificent, and fully indicative of his wayward genius. One writer de- sccibes them as large and animated, with dash of wildness in them;'' an other speaks of them as ''Such a pair of eyes as are rarely seen in 8 human or any other head, intently blue, with a gentle and lambert expression, yet won derfully alert and engrosSing." Med with, while writing of Shelley's appear ance, refers to his blue eyes, ''very large and prominent. They were at times, when he was bstractcd as he often was in contemplation, dull, and, as it were, insensible to external ob- jects; at others, they flashed with the fire of intelligence" Tom Moorc's eyes were ''as dark and fine as you would wish to S,e under a set of vine leaves.'
 Of Coleridga it is reported "Iis forehead was p:odigious-a great piece of placid marble; and his fine eyes, in which all the activity of his mind seemed to conc" nitrate, moved under it with sprightly ease, as if it were pastime to them to carry all that thought" Another friend of his writes: ''The upper part of Coleridge's face was excessively fine. His eyes were large, light gray, and prominent, of liquid brilliancy, which some eyes of fine character may ~N orb itself retreated to tho inner- most recess of the brain.'' In his "Lifo of Sterling" Carlyle introduces his fa- nous description of Colcridges appear ance. "The deep eyes, of light hazel, were," he says, "as full of sorrows as of inspiration; confused pain looked mild ly from them, as in a kind of mild as- tonishment."
 The eyes of Keats were described by one of his contemporaries as ''mellow and glowing; large, dark and sensitivc." Cowden Clarke states that they were of a brown color, or dark hazel. thus con- tradicting Mrs. Proctor's assertion that they were ''blue.'
 ''Thc finest eyes, in every sense of the word. which l have seen in a mans head (and have seen many fine ones) are those of Thomas Carlyle" Such is the testimony of Leigh Hunt. In de- scription of the "Chelsea Sage as lecturer at Willis rooms, we find tho following: 'There he stood, rugged of feature, brow abrupt like a tow cliff, asaggy over eyes deep set, large, pierc- ing, between blue and dark gray, full of rolling fire"
 Leigh Hunt. in his Autobiography" speaking of Wordsworth appearance, says: ''I never behcld eyes that looked SO inspired or supernatural. They wcro like fires half burning, half smoulder- ing, with a sort of acrid fixture of re- gard, and seated at the further end of two caverns One might imagine Eze- kiel or Isaiah to have had such eyes"
 Walter Scott says of Burns: There was strong expression of sense and shrewdness in all his lineaments; the eye alone, l think, indicated the poetical character and temperament. It was large, and of class that glowcd q say literally glowed) when he spoke with feeling or interest I never saw such another eye in a human head, though I have seen the most distinguished mer of my time. e."-Chambers' Journal.