A white marble figure of a young maiden standing with robe loose on waist holding a butterfly in right hand against her breast. She is gazing down at the butterfly. The sculpture is after Canova's 'Psyche' at the Kunsthalle Bremen. Psyche was the personification of the soul; there is a late classical legend of the love story between Cupid (earthly love) and Psyche (spiritual love) in which she suffers many tribulations. Psyche is also the Greek for a butterfly, an image of transient beauty, and in this statue she holds a butterfly. Cupid and Psyche were popular in sculpture and painting from the late eighteenth century and through the nineteenth century. The original of this statue was probably commissioned from Canova in 1792 by Henry Blundell of Liverpool for his considerable collection of ancient and contemporary marbles at Ince Blundell near Liverpool.