You see Isis, as Pelagia, advancing
between two ranks, one of joyous maidens in snow-white garments,
adorned with wreaths, and scattering from their bosoms all kinds of
dewy flowers; the other of youths, playing upon pipes and flutes,
mixed with men with shaven shining crowns, playing upon sistra of
brass, silver, and gold. Isis wears a Dorian tunic, fastened on her
breast by a tasselled knot,--an azure-coloured tunic bordered with
silver stars,--and an upper garment of the colour of the moon at
moonrise. Her head is crowned with a chaplet of sea-flowers, and
round her throat is a necklace of seaweeds, wet still with sea-water,
and shimmering with all the shifting hues of the sea. On either side
of her stand the awakened angels, uplifting from her face a veil
whose folds flow soft as water over her shoulders and over the wings
of Faith and Love. A symbol of the true cosmogony which Philip Aylwin
gave to the world!'
'Why, that's esackly like the wreath o' seaweeds as poor Winnie Wynne
used to make,' said Rhona Boswell.
'The photograph of Raxton Fair!' I cried.
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