he omnibus, and
thenceforward avoided Paul at the Polytechnic Institute.

This uncompromising pronouncement on the part of Higgins was a shock;
but together with other incidents, chiefly psychological, vague,
intangible phenomena of his spiritual development, it showed Paul the
possibility of another point of view. He took stock of himself. From
the picturesque boy he had grown into the physically perfect man. As a
model he was no longer sought after for subject pieces. He was in
clamorous demand at Life Schools, where he drew a higher rate of pay,
but where he was as impersonal to the intently working students as the
cast of the Greek torso which other students were copying in the next
room. The intimacy of the studio, the warmth and the colour and the
meretricious luxury were gone from his life. On the other hand he was
making money. He had fifty pounds in the Savings Bank, the maximum of
petty thrift which an incomprehensive British Government encourages,
and a fair, though unknown, sum in an iron money-box hidden behind his
washstand. Up to now he had had no time to learn how to spend money.
When he took to smoking cigarettes, which he had done quite recently,
he regarded himself as a man.

Higgins's "How beastly!" rang in his head. Although he could not quite
understand the full meaning of the brutal judgment, it brought him
disquiet and discontent. For one thing, like the high-road, his
profession led nowhither. The thrill of adventure had gone from it. It
was static, and Paul's temperament was dynamic. He had also lost his
boyish sense of importance, of being the central figure in the little
stage. Disillusion began to creep over him. Would he do nothing else
but this all his life? Old Erricone, the patriarchal, white-bearded
Italian, the doyen of the models of London, came before his mind, a
senile posturer, mumbling dreary tales of his inglorious achievements:
how he was the Roman Emperor in this picture and Father Abraham in the
other; how painters could not get on without him; how once he had been
summoned from Rome to London; how Rossetti had shaken hands with him.
Paul shivered at the thought of himself as the Erricone of a future
generation.

The next day was Saturday, and he had no sitting. The morning he spent
in his small bedroom in the soothing throes of literary composition.
Some time ago he had thought it would be a mighty fine thing to be a
poet, and had tried his hand at verse. Finding he posses