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boy for fear of tumbling off his
manly dignity, and then he'd be a fool, poor thing."
    He laughed, and sat still to think about it, as was his way.
    "Do you like pictures?" she asked suddenly, being tired of looking at
him.
    "Better than anything," he replied.
    "Except dinner, and a warm hearth and a lazy evening," she said.
    He looked at her suddenly, hardening at her insult, and biting his lips
at the taste of this humiliation. She repented, and smiled her plaintive
regret to him.
    "I'll show you some," she said, rising and going out of the room. He
felt he was nearer her. She returned, carrying a pile of great books.
    "Jove—you're pretty strong!" said he.
    "You are charming in your compliment," she said.
    He glanced at her to see if she were mocking.
    "That's the highest you could say of me, isn't it?" she insisted.
    "Is it?" he asked, unwilling to compromise himself.
    "For sure," she answered—and then, laying the books on the table, "I
know how a man will compliment me by the way he looks at me"—she
kneeled before the fire. "Some look at my hair, some watch the rise and
fall of my breathing, some look at my neck, and a few,—not you among
them,—look me in the eyes for my thoughts. To you, I'm a fine specimen,
strong! Pretty strong! You primitive man!"
    He sat twisting his fingers; she was very contrary.
    "Bring your chair up," she said, sitting down at the table and opening a
book. She talked to him of each picture, insisting on hearing his
opinion. Sometimes he disagreed with her and would not be persuaded. At
such times she was piqued.
    "If," said she, "an ancient Briton in his skins came and contradicted me
as you do, wouldn't you tell him not to make an ass of himself?"
    "I don't know," said he.
    "Then you ought to," she replied. "You know nothing."
    "How is it you ask me then?" he said.
    She began to laugh.
    "Why—that's a pertinent question. I think you might be rather nice, you
know."
    "Thank you," he said, smiling ironically.
    "Oh!" she said. "I know, you think you're perfect, but you're not,
you're very annoying."
    "Yes," exclaimed Alice, who had entered the room again, dressed ready to
depart. "He's so blooming slow! Great whizz! Who wants fellows to carry
cold dinners? Shouldn't you like to shake him Lettie?"
    "I don't feel concerned enough," replied the other calmly.
    "Did you ever carry a boiled pudding Georgy?" asked Alice with innocent
interest, punching me slyly.
    "Me!—why?—what makes you ask?" he replied, quite at a loss.
    "Oh, I only wondered if your people needed any indigestion mixture—pa
mixes it—1/1 ½ a bottle."
    "I don't see——" he began.
    "Ta—ta, old boy, I'll give you time to think about it. Good–night,
Lettie. Absence makes the heart grow fonder—Georgy—of someone else.
Farewell. Come along, Sybil love, the moon is shining—Good–night all,
good–night!"
    I escorted her home, while they continued to look at the pictures. He
was a romanticist. He liked Copley, Fielding, Cattermole and Birket
Foster; he could see nothing whatsoever in Girtin or David Cox. They
fell out decidedly over George Clausen.
    "But," said Lettie, "he is a real realist, he makes common things
beautiful, he sees the mystery and magnificence that envelops us even
when we work menially. I do know and I can speak. If I hoed in the
fields beside you——" This was a very new idea for him, almost a shock
to his imagination, and she talked unheeded. The picture under
discussion was a water–colour—"Hoeing" by Clausen.
    "You'd be just that colour in the sunset," she said, thus bringing him
back to the subject, "and if you looked at the ground you'd find there
was a sense of warm gold fire in it, and once you'd perceived the
colour, it would strengthen till you'd see nothing else. You are blind;
you are only half–born; you are gross with good living and heavy
sleeping. You are a piano which will only play a dozen common notes.
Sunset is nothing to you—it merely happens anywhere. Oh, but you