A girl, three-quarter length seated on a wooden open stool with carved wooden heads and black-bordered red cushion, in white silk dress with white sash, holding her long blue, orange and green scarf in her hands and draped over her shoulders, gem-set gold headband worn across her forehead, long curling fair hair; draped green curtain, stone balcony, landscape and sky background (artist's join)

The artist, Renée Félicie Varlet de Gibecourt, from Lille, married Adolphe de Watteville (1799-1867) in 1820.
The identification of the sitter as Mlle Volnais, as suggested in the 1956 exhibition catalogue, is unlikely. Although the unusual size of the miniature would have made it a perfect object to be shown in the Paris Salon, the portrait of Mlle Volnais exhibited by Félicie Varlet in 1819 depicts the sitter in the theatrical role of Adélaïde du Guesclin. In the same year, Félicie Varlet exhibited several other miniatures in the Salon (as no. 1137: 'Plusieurs portraits'), but without the identification of their names, which may well include the present portrait.