strength, and yet such grace!
You should have the bowl he drank the milk out of, so as to tell
the whole story. No painter living tells a story so well as you do,
Conway." Conway Dalrymple knew that the woman was talking nonsense to
him, and yet he liked it, and liked her for talking it.

"But Mr. Dalrymple can paint his Sisera without making me a Jael,"
said Miss Van Siever.

"Of course he can," said Mrs. Broughton.

"But I never will," said the artist. "I conceived the subject as
connected with you, and I will never disjoin the two ideas."

"I think it no compliment, I can assure you," said Miss Van Siever.

"And none was intended. But you may observe that artists in all
ages have sought for higher types of models in painting women who
have been violent or criminal, than have sufficed for them in their
portraitures of gentleness and virtue. Look at all the Judiths, and
the Lucretias, and the Charlotte Cordays; how much finer the women
are than the Madonnas and the Saint Cecilias."

"After that, Clara, you need not scruple to be a Jael," said Mrs
Broughton.

"But I do scruple,--very much; so strongly that I know I never shall
do it. In the first place I don't know why Mr. Dalrymple wants it."

"Want it!" said Conway. "I want to paint a striking picture."

"But you can do that without putting me into it."

"No;--not this picture. And why should you object? It is the
commonest thing in the world for ladies to sit to artists in that
manner."

"People would know it."

"Nobody would know it, so that you need care about it. What would
it matter if everybody knew it? We are not proposing anything
improper;--are we, Mrs. Broughton?"

"She shall not be pressed if she does not like it," said Mrs
Broughton. "You know I told you before Clara came in, that I was
afraid it could not be done."

"And I don't like it," said Miss Van Siever, with some little
hesitation in her voice.

"I don't see anything improper in it, if you mean that," said Mrs
Broughton.

"But, mamma!"

"Well, yes; that is the difficulty, no doubt. The only question is,
whether your mother is not so very singular, as to make it impossible
that you should comply with her in everything."

"I am afraid that I do not comply with her in very much," said Miss
Van Siever in her gentlest voice.

"Oh, Clara!"

"You drive me to say so, as otherwise I should be a hypocrite. Of
course I ought not to have said it before Mr. Dalrymple."

"You and Mr