Serafina, the “leading lady” of the troupe, was a handsome young woman of four or five and twenty, who had quite a grand air, and was as dignified and graceful withal as any veritable noble dame who shone at the court of his most gracious majesty, Louis XIII.  She had an oval face, slightly aquiline nose, large gray eyes, bright red lips—­the under one full and pouting, like a ripe cherry—–­a very fair complexion, with a beautiful colour in her cheeks when she was animated or excited, and rich masses of dark brown hair most becomingly arranged.  She wore a round felt hat, with the wide rim turned up at one side, and trimmed with long, floating plumes.  A broad lace collar was turned down over her dark green velvet dress, which was elaborately braided, and fitted closely to a fine, well-developed figure.  A long, black silk scarf was worn negligently around her shapely shoulders and although both velvet and silk were old and dingy, and the feathers in her hat wet and limp, they were still very effective, and she looked like a young queen who had strayed away from her realm; the freshness and radiant beauty of her face more than made up for the shabbiness of her dress, and de Sigognac was fairly dazzled by her many charms.

Isabelle was much more youthful than Serafina, as was requisite for her role of ingenuous young girl, and far more simply dressed.  She had a sweet, almost childlike face, beautiful, silky, chestnut hair, with golden lights in it, dark, sweeping lashes veiling her large, soft eyes, a little rosebud of a mouth, and an air of modesty and purity that was evidently natural to her—­not assumed.  A gray silk gown, simply made, showed to advantage her slender, graceful form, which seemed far too fragile to endure the hardships inseparable from the wandering life she was leading.  A high Elizabethan ruff made a most becoming frame for her sweet, delicately tinted, young face, and her only ornament was a string of pearl beads, clasped round her slender, white neck.  Though her beauty was less striking at first sight than Serafina’s, it was of a higher order:  not dazzling like hers, but surpassingly lovely in its exquisite purity and freshness, and promising to eclipse the other’s more showy charms, when the half-opened bud should have expanded into the full-blown flower.

The soubrette was like a beautiful Gipsy, with a clear, dark complexion, rich, mantling colour in her velvety cheeks, intensely black hair—­long, thick, and wavy—­great, flashing, brown eyes, and rather a large mouth, with ripe, red lips, and dazzling white teeth—­one’s very beau-ideal of a bewitching, intriguing waiting-maid, and one that might be a dangerous rival to any but a surpassingly lovely and fascinating mistress.  She was one of the beauties that women are not apt to admire, but men rave about and run after the world over.  She wore a fantastic costume of blue and yellow, which was odd, piquant, and becoming, and seemed fully conscious of her own charms.