day at the shop; and then, nights
and Sundays he works on his statue as long as I can keep up."

She got a big chisel, to use as a lever, and between us we managed to
twist the pedestal round and round, so as to afford a view of the statue
from all points. Well, sir, it was perfectly charming, this girl's
innocence and purity---exhibiting her naked self, as it were, to a
stranger and alone, and never once dreaming that there was the slightest
indelicacy about the matter. And so there wasn't; but it will be many
along day before I run across another woman who can do the like and show
no trace of self-consciousness.

Well, then we sat down, and I took a smoke, and she told me all about
her people in Massachusetts--her father is a physician and it is an old
and respectable family--(I am able to believe anything she says.) And
she told me how "Karl" is 26 years old; and how he has had passionate
longings all his life toward art, but has always been poor and obliged
to struggle for his daily bread; and how he felt sure that if he could
only have one or two lessons in--

"Lessons? Hasn't he had any lessons?"

No. He had never had a lesson.

And presently it was dinner time and "Karl" arrived--a slender young
fellow with a marvelous head and a noble eye--and he was as simple and
natural, and as beautiful in spirit as his wife was. But she had to do
the talking--mainly--there was too much thought behind his cavernous
eyes for glib speech.

I went home enchanted. Told Livy and Clara Spaulding all about the
paradise down yonder where those two enthusiasts are happy with a
yearly expense of $350. Livy and Clara went there next day and came away
enchanted. A few nights later the Gerhardts kept their promise and came
here for the evening. It was billiard night and I had company and so
was not down; but Livy and Clara became more charmed with these children
than ever.

Warner and I planned to get somebody to criticise the statue whose
judgment would be worth something. So I laid for Champney, and after two
failures I captured him and took him around, and he said "this statue
is full of faults--but it has merits enough in it to make up for
them"--whereat the young wife danced around as delighted as a child.
When we came away, Champney said, "I did not want to say too much there,
but the truth is, it seems to me an extraordinary performance for an
untrained hand. You ask if there is promise enough there to justify
the Hartford