cumstances; it would add immensely to the effect of the design.
Look well and carefully at the predella first. Try to imagine the
Oriental Queen behind that veil, then observe the way in which the
features are expressed through the veil; and then, but not till then,
come into the adjoining room and see the picture itself, see what
Isis really is (according to the sublime idea of Philip Aylwin) when
Faith and Love, the twin angels of all true art, upraise the veil.'

He then turned and passed through the folding-doors into a room of
great size, crowded with easels, upon which pictures were resting.

The predella before me seemed a miracle of imaginative power. At that
time I had not seen the work of the great poet-painter of modern
times whom Wilderspin called 'the Master,' and by whom he had been
unconsciously inspired.

'Most beautiful!' my mother ejaculated, as we three lingered before
the predella. 'Do look at the filmy texture of the veil.'

'Looks more like steam than a white veil, don't you know?' said
Sleaford.

'Like steam, my lord?' exclaimed Wilderspin from the next room. 'The
painter of that veil had peculiar privileges. As a child he had been
in the habit of watching a face through the curtain of steam around a
blacksmith's forge when hot iron is plunged into the water-trench,
and the face, my lord, though begrimed by earthly toil, was an
angel's. No wonder, then, that the painting in that veil is unique in
art. The flesh-tints that are pearly and yet rosy seem, as you
observe, to be breaking through it, and yet you cannot say what is
the actual expression on the face. But now come and see the picture
itself.'

My mother and Sleaford lingered for a moment longer, and then passed
between the folding-doors.

But I did not follow them; I could not. For now there was something
in the predella before me which fascinated me, I scarcely knew why.
It was the figure of the queen--the figure between the two sleeping
angels--the figure behind the veil, and expressed by the veil--that
enthralled me.

There was a turn about the outlined neck and head that riveted my
gaze; and, as I looked from these to the veil falling over the face,
a vision seemed to be rapidly growing before my eyes--a vision that
stopped my breath--a vision of a face struggling to express itself
through that snowy film--_whose_ face?

* * * * *

'In the crypt my senses had a kind of license to play me tricks,' I
murm