iderations which induced me to avoid this, if I could. To the extent
of a guinea (or even thirty shillings) I could refuse her nothing; but
every one knows what sums are demanded by a photographer who is at all
in vogue. I might, to be sure, as a public character, have sat without
being called upon for any consideration, beyond the right to dispose of
copies of my photograph; but I felt that Iris would be a little hurt if
I took this course, and none of the West-end people whom I consulted in
the matter quite saw their way to such an arrangement just then. There
was a temporary lull, they assured me, in the demand for likenesses of
our leading literary men, and I myself had been photographed within too
recent a period to form any exception to the rule.

So, keeping my promise constantly in mind, I never entered a secluded
neighbourhood without being on the look-out for some unpretending
photographic studio which would combine artistic excellence with
moderate charges.

And at last I discovered this photographic phoenix, whose nest, if I
may so term it, was in a retired suburb which I do not care to
particularise. Upon the street level was a handsome plate-glass window,
in which, against a background of dark purple hangings and potted ferns,
were displayed cartes, cabinets, and groups, in which not even my
trained faculties could detect the least inferiority to the more costly
productions of the West-end, while the list of prices that hung by the
door was conceived in a spirit of exemplary modesty. After a brief
period of hesitation I stepped inside, and, on stating my wish to be
photographed at once, was invited by a very civil youth with a slight
cast in his eye to walk upstairs, which I accordingly did.

I mounted flight after flight of stairs, till I eventually found myself
at the top of the house, in an apartment pervaded by a strong odour of
chemicals, and glazed along the roof and the whole of one side with
panes of a bluish tint. It was empty at the moment of my entrance, but,
after a few minutes, the photographer burst impetuously in--a tall young
man, with long hair and pale eyes, whose appearance denoted a nervous
and high-strung temperament. Perceiving him to be slightly overawed by a
certain unconscious dignity in my bearing, which frequently does produce
that effect upon strangers, I hastened to reassure him by discriminating
eulogies upon the specimens of his art that I had been inspecting
below, and I s