ience of my
own, however, subsequently enlightened me as to the possible nervous
effect of such immobility and strained attention.

My friend Sir Frederick Leighton, despairing of finding a model to
assume a sufficiently dramatic expression of wickedness for a
picture he was painting of Jezebel, was deploring his difficulty one
day, when Henry Greville, who was standing by, said to him, "Why
don't you ask her"--pointing to me--"to do it for you?" Leighton
expressed some kindly reluctance to put my countenance to such a
use; but I had not the slightest objection to stand for Jezebel, if
by so doing I could help him out of his dilemma. So to his studio I
went, ascended his platform, and having been duly placed in the
attitude required, and instructed on what precise point of the wall
opposite to me to fix my eyes, I fell to thinking of the scene the
picture represented, of the meeting between Ahab and his wicked
queen with Elijah on the threshold of Naboth's vineyard,
endeavoring, after my old stage fashion, to assume as thoroughly as
possible the character which I was representing. Before I had
retained the constrained attitude and fixed immovable gaze for more
than a short time, my eyes grew dim, the wall I was glaring at
seemed to waver about before me, I turned sick, a cold perspiration
broke out on my forehead, my ears buzzed, my knees trembled, my
heart throbbed, and I suppose I was not far from a fainting fit. I
sat abruptly down on the platform, and called my friendly artist to
my assistance, describing to him my sensations, and asking if he
could explain what had occasioned them. He expressed remorseful
distress at having subjected me to such annoyance, saying, however,
that my condition was not an uncommon one for painters' models to be
thrown into by the nervous strain of the fixed look and attention,
and rigid immobility of position, required of them; that he had
known men succumb to it on a first experiment, but had thought me so
strong, and so little liable to any purely nervous affection, that
it had never occurred to him for a moment that there was any danger
of my being thus overcome.

I recovered almost immediately, the nervous strain being taken off,
and resumed my duty as a model, taking care to vary my expression
and attitude whenever I felt at all weary, and