Yet there was nothing effeminate or foppish about his appearance.
A follower of that now forgotten science, phrenology, would have been impressed by Lionel Varick's head.

It was large and well-shaped, with a great deal of almost golden hair, now showing a white thread or two, which did not, however, detract from his look of youth.

He had a fine broad forehead; deep, well-set grey eyes; and a beautiful, sensitive mouth, which he took care not to conceal with a moustache.

Thus in almost any company he would have looked striking and distinguished--the sort of man of whom people ask, "Who is that standing over there ?" Varick was a man of moods--subject, that is, to fits of exultation and of depression--and yet with an amazing power of self-control, and of entirely hiding what he felt from those about him.
To-night his mood was one of exultation.

He almost felt what Scots call "fey." Something seemed to tell him that he was within reach of the fruition of desires which, even in his most confident moments, had appeared till now wildly out of any possibility of attainment.