Giselle's feet are a recurring image in this section. Nostromo clearly finds them attractive, but the meaning is subtler than that. Feet are used to walk on the earth, and Nostromo's fantasy of "her own land" below is "to set her little feet upon," so, allegorically, Giselle's feet represent the ideal of utopian socialism brought to earth, to reality. As we read further, however, a complication with the feet will arise. They are dressed in "white stockings and black slippers," sounding a moral alarm that the earthly part may not be as pure as the inner. In the next chapter Linda will call Giselle a "vile thing of white flesh and black deception." The implication, as I read it, is that the ideal of utopian socialism is a pretty deception, deceptive precisely in its promise of being brought unstained to earth. Note in the next paragraph where utopian socialism must lower its eyes to discover its feet, as if called downward toward reality by the voice of the People.