ect he
had many colleagues in the fraternity of art, as more than one-half of
our artists do not manage to get enough to eat, which fact may explain
why many paint so insipidly.

A few days before his sudden death, an old gentleman, a chance
acquaintance, was talking with him about the muddy coloring of the
pictures. Old Melville's eyes wandered over the four walls representing
a life's work; at first he ardently argued in their favor, but finally
gave in that they, perhaps, were a little bit too dark. "Why do you not
take a studio where you can see real sunlight; there is one empty now
with Southern exposure, right in this building." Old Melville shook his
head, murmuring some excuses of "can't afford it," of "being used so
long to this one," but his visitor insisted, "he would pay the rent and
fix matters with the landlord." The good soul did not understand much
about painting, about tones and values, but merely wanted to get the old
man into a more cheerful room.

It was difficult for old Melville to take leave of his studio, in which
he had seen a quarter of a century roll by, which he had entered as a
man in the best years of his life, and now left as an old man; but when
he had moved into the new room, the walls of which were an agreeable
gray, he exclaimed, "How nice and light!" After arranging his few
earthly possessions, he brought out a new canvas, opened a side window,
sat down once more before his easel, and gazed intently at the sunshine
streaming in and playing on the newly painted and varnished floor.

For years he had wielded the brush every day, but on this day he somehow
could not paint; he could not find the right harmony. He at first
attributed it to a cold which he had contracted, but later on, irritated
and somewhat frightened, he mumbled to himself, "I fear I can't paint in
this room." And thus he sat musing at his easel with the blank canvas
before him, blank as once his youth had been, full of possibilities of a
successful career, when suddenly an inspiration came upon him. He saw
before him the orchard of his father's little Canadian farm, with the
old apple trees in bloom, bathed in the sweet and subtle sunlight of
spring, a scene that for years had lain hidden among the faint, almost
forgotten memories of his childhood days, but now by some trick of
memory was conjured up with appalling distinctiveness. This he wished to
realize in paint, and should he perish in the effort!

Feverishly he