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be true, dear Doctor, and no one could help agreeing with you. Still, don't you think that love may sometimes be the best teacher -the truest expounder? Might not the success achieved in thisin a picture of this kind, be due less to the skill of the artist than to-you know-the sentiment that inspired him ?"

The Doctor raised his eyebrows and let them fall again; folded his arms a trifle tighter than before, and looking full at Edward, said in his softest tone

"I don't understand

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Had Edward been older or wiser than he was, he would have perceived that the Doctor did understand, but that he desired, not an explanation, but a disclaimer; and that he was pausing in that interrogative manner in order to give him a chance to retract ere it was too late.

But Edward was neither old nor wise, and furthermore he was in love. So, having made up his mind beforehand that the revelation should take place today, he was blind to all sinister omens, and with little further preface he blurted out the whole story.

It is unnecessary to give it at length here. The burden of it was that Edward loved Fannie, and Fannie, Edward; and by way of eloquently impressing the fact on the Doctor's mind, the unlucky youth so amplified, beflowered, and bespangled it with rhetorical ornament, that redundancy could no farther go. Had his listener been thirsting all his life long to hear precisely this communication, the prolixity of its delivery must needs have bored him; but he never had so thirsted. When, therefore, Edward at last stopped the torrent of his words, and stood before his patron with flushed cheeks, kindling eyes, and the and the conviction that he had made a

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so long, however, that Edward began to grow restless. Not that he had misgivings; his cause was too reasonable as well as too wellpleaded to allow of that; but he did feel a slight disappointment that the response had not come with greater spontaneity and gush. And to do the young man justice, he had fair grounds for hope; and but for one untoward circumstance, which he could not be expected to know of, all might have turned out happily. Insomuch as a knowledge of this circumstance will throw some necessary light on what happened afterwards, be the reader informed that it was simply this: the Doctor was himself in love with Francesca.

The Doctor had always been an excellent man as the world goes; but persons with a large amount of uninvested intellect on hand are not always trustworthy, whether as regards themselves or others. And it was scarcely to be expected that he should make haste to enrich a rival at the expense both of his purse and his heart; nor can he be blamed for taking whatever advantage of a young and handsome rival a gentleman quite in the meridian of life might find possible. Now, the Doctor held two trumps-his wealth, and Edward's ignorance of his rivalship. A romantic notion of self-sacrifice might, perhaps, have prompted him to forbear playing them; but he was past the age of romantic notions, and to play his trumps he was resolved; the chief question in his mind was how best to do it.

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He unfolded his arms, laid hold of the root of his nose between the eyes with his thumb and forefinger, and brought them slowly down its somewhat excessive length to the tip. Then, looking up at Edward with a mildly inscrutable expression, and speaking in a tone of musical gentleness, he saidEdward, I will be sincere with you. You have surprised me-even shaken me-not a little. As for Francesca, a father's love and care for her could hardly equal my own; and I must allow no partiality even for you to blind me to her highest good. Because I must be judicious and conscientious, do not think me selfish.'

Oh no-no indeed! Edward was poor-he knew that; but he trusted not always to be so. He had hopes that in time

"The practice of your art may enrich you?" the Doctor interposed gently. "Yes: but, J ask you, Edward, does genius always mean wealth? Does not the very excellence of this picture of yours, for example, militate against its popularity? Is it not a rule of life-The loftier, the more isolated ?"

"But, dear Doctor, might not even a comparatively narrow circle suffice to

"Well objected! Yes,-command the right audience,-the fit though few-and your fortune, comparatively speaking, may still be secure. Nay, gain the hearty patronage of but a single admirer, whose taste and whose means are both of the first order,-and why seek further? Do you take my meaning, Edward ?'"

Edward might perhaps have failed to do so, had not the Doctor happened, at this juncture, to thrust his hands carelessly into his into his trousers' pockets, eliciting thence a subdued clinking sound, the inference from which was irresis

tible. The young man coloured, and threw upon the other a quick questioning glance. The Doctor nodded his head slowly.

"On two conditions," he resumed after a pause, "both of them simple and easy of fulfilment, I will engage to assure your fortune. The first condition is this-All pictures painted by you from this time forth, are to belong The second condition is this: You are to paint nothing but copies of the picture now on your easel. Do you agree?"

to me.

Edward grasped his benefactor's hand fervently. "Oh! can it be true? How good, how kind you are! how-"

"There, there!" the Doctor interrupted, a peculiar covert smile. accompanying the deprecating gesture that he made. "And now as to terms. I propose to pay you a thousand pounds for the first completed copy of your picture; eleven hundred for the second; twelve hundred for the third, and so on, increasing at the rate of one hundred pounds on each successive reproduction. On your simple diligence, therefore, will it depend in how many years or months you become rich."

"Oh, Doctor! you are an angel! and Fannie

"But remember!" the Doctor added, rising from his chair and lifting his finger emphatically; "if you paint for any one but me; or if you produce anything else than copies of this picture, all money up to that time received is forfeited. You understand?”

"Perfectly, dearest Doctor. And when I'm rich I may marry Fannie?"

The Doctor laid his hand on Edward's shoulder, and looked long and fixedly at him. At last he said

"When you feel no further need or desire for money, Francesca

is yours. But so long as you are conscious of requiring yet a single shilling to make up the sum of your pecuniary ambition, you must not claim her."

"I'm sure," exclaimed Edward impulsively, "that a thousand

pounds will be all I want-more than I want! And it won't take me long to paint that one copy; not more than a very few months, at most."

"A year is not such a very long time, Edward," remarked the Doctor, still with his eyes upon him, "and you and Francesca are still very young. Probably, by applying yourself diligently, you could paint at least three copies in a year. That would be three thousand three hundred pounds sterling. Don't you think you could make your wife more comfortable and happy with such a sum than with a single thousand? Remember, she has always been accustomed to luxury

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"It is to be just as you decide," rejoined the Doctor musically. "Your future is in your own hands. Love is better than money, no doubt; though money may have its uses, even for love."

Edward hesitated; the bright light in his eyes became a little less bright, and the flush of enthusiasm died away on his forehead. After a few moments' reflection he spoke in a heavier tone.

"I suppose you are right, Doctor; a year is not so very long to wait; and I daresay I could get four copies done in that time, by working hard. That would be four thousand six hundred pounds! dear me, what a lot of money! Almost five thousand."

"Well, I must go now," said

the Doctor, looking at his watch and moving towards the door. "And my advice, Edward, is, take short views; don't commit yourself to either one course or the other too rashly. Paint your first copy; then, if it seems best to you to stop there, do so; if not, go on. There is no need of settling it all beforehand. Good-bye; I suppose you will want to be getting to work forthwith."

"Good-bye," returned the artist, rousing himself as from a reverie, and sighing. You are very kind -and very wise!"

As the Doctor descended the narrow stairs to the street, the peculiar smile which had dwelt upon his features a while before, returned, and was broader than before.

"I am sure of him," he murmured to himself; "and as for my little Francesca, she is a beautiful -young-girl!"

Edward, when he found himself alone, did not immediately fall to work upon the first copy, but threw himself into a chair, lit a pipe, and composed himself to reflect upon his good fortune. But, somehow or other, he was not quite so cheerful as he ought to have been; not even so cheerful as before the Doctor's munificent offer was made. Whither had vanished that glow and fervour for his art which he had felt an hour since? Whence came this vague sense of a desecration committed somewhere? A certain throb of the heart, half fearful, half exultant, which, when looking forward to the battle of life, it had been his wont to feel, was absent now. But that could

hardly be otherwise. His future was already a thing of the past: there it stood upon the easel-or jingled in the Doctor's pocket! The studio was a mint; he himself -a coiner. Artist, indeed!

But here Edward knocked the ashes irritably out of his pipe and

called himself a fool. What could

be more absurd than for him to indulge himself with such morbid nonsense? Was not love-Fannie -the cause and end of all his efforts? What reason had he, in the name of common sense, to be discontented? It was plain, as the Doctor had pointed out, that only the power to support Fannie could confer upon him the right to possess her. Why be romantic and silly? Life was not, now, what it used to be in the Golden Age; it was a serious, practical business, not a rose-coloured vision. Money first, therefore, and afterwards-Fannie. Yes, that was the correct principle.

Doubtless his friend and benefactor, the Doctor, would have been gratified could he have heard his protégé enunciate it. The learned gentleman lay stretched out in his favourite easy-chair, abstractedly stroking his long nose. His countenance had in a measure lost the grave philosophic calm that ordinarily belonged to it. Perhaps it was due to the extra glass of wine which he had that day taken after dinner, but his expression was astute, not to say roguish. He was playing a very shrewd game, wherein his penetrating insight and worldly wisdom were serving him well. An interesting, absorbing game, too; for what could be more fascinating than to take a fresh young soul, and, by dint of one's knowledge of its elements and tendencies, to mould it into something quite at variance with its Creator's intention? And how additionally agreeable, were the experiment fraught with desirable consequences to one's self-with nothing less than the successful consummation of a sincere attachment! Therefore, thrice happy Doctor! No wonder he smiled so peculiarly, as he stroked his long

nose.

A certain class of timid and pettifogging moralists might, it is true, inquire whether, in the process of reconstructing other people's souls, he did not risk the symmetry of his own? and whether the record of his curious researches might not one day come to be read upon his own philosophic visage ? But the Doctor, it is needless to observe, would have been superior to such innuendoes; although I will not go out of my way to prove that his conduct in this matter was, from the moral point of view, altogether unexceptionable.

But, on the other hand, it must be admitted that many a man, in his position, would have acted in a far less gentle and considerate manner. Would it not have been easy for him to have sent Edward packing, without a shilling, and to have forbidden him ever to come near Francesca again? Instead of that, was he not stuffing the not stuffing the young fellow's empty pockets with gold, with a prospect of connubial bliss to come on the top of that? Let hairsplitting moralists say what they would, the Doctor was, from any rational and logical stand-point, the most benevolent and liberal of

men.

Meanwhile the innocent and lovely cause of these effects was pursuing her wonted occupations of feeding her birds, watering her flowers, singing her songs, and reading her books of fairy tales. But on the morning following her guardian's visit to the studio, while she was sitting in the conservatory under an orange tree, an orange in one hand and an orange blossom in the other, a letter was brought to her, the perfume of which brought to mind the tobacco pipe of her dear Edward. The orange rolled unheeded to the floor, the blossom dropped in her lap, and she snatched

the letter with a coo of pleasure. Of the depth and fervour of such love as hers, what further proof was needed?

She began the letter with a smile; but as she proceeded, the smile gradually died away, and her sweet eyebrows arched themselves plaintively. Her tender blue eyes opened themselves very wide at nothing, she put one taper finger to her lips, and sighed.

"Oh dear me!" she murmured, "what dreadful things men are! and now Edward is going to be just as dreadful as the rest of them. He never used to say anything before, except that he loved me ever so much, and that I was the inspiration of his art, and the object of his life, and all sorts of nice things of that kind; but now he's beginning to bother about money, and supporting me, and business, and being practical, and everything else that is tiresome. I declare it is too bad! He's going to be like other men. I do wish there wasn't any such thing as money; I don't see the use of it. I'm sure I never want any; Guardie gets me everything that I ever want. It was sweet of dear old Guardie, though, to be so generous to Edward. And perhaps, after all, money may be useful after one's married, though it's horrid to be always talking and thinking about it. I wonder how much will be enough? I'll ask Guardie when I see him. I don't believe anybody ever could spend so much as a thousand pounds, however much they were married. Oh dear!"

So sustained a stretch of thought, reasoning and speculation was too exhausting for our pretty Francesca. She resorted to her fairy stories for rest and consolation; but she failed to get as much out of them as she had been accustomed to. Again and again the

beloved and hitherto inexhaustible legends seemed to lose their charm; the book closed, and the pensive look returned to the reader's face. And when, that afternoon, she came into the Doctor's study to pour out his cup of tea for him, her white forehead was corrugated, and the corners of her mouth drooped in a pathetic manner. The Doctor, however, appeared not to notice her distraught condition; he did what was better; he made her forget it. Francesca had always thought him good and kind, but this afternoon he was fascinating; she had never been so well entertained. Edward's letter, and all the doubt and distress which it had brought upon her, slipped clean out of her remembrance. She sat on a little stool at the Doctor's feet, and while he sipped his tea and stroked her soft brown hair, he told her no end of delightful stories, more amusing even than those in the fairy-book, though of a very different kind. They were about real people, and about things that happen in the real world. One of the funniest was concerning the misfortunes of an absurd young couple, who got married without money enough to pay the minister his fee. It was irresistibly ludicrous, as the Doctor told it, and Francesca laughed her blue eyes full of tears. In the midst of her mirth, however, she was suddenly sobered by the reflection that, no longer ago than that very morning, she would have known no better than to do just so absurd a thing herself! Ah! how much she had learned since this morning. But, as the Doctor had said, she was only a beautiful young girl, open to be taught anything.

Edward was not long in getting to work upon the first copy of his picture, and by dint of constant labour he finished it in a very few months. It was beautifully

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