he jury of
examiners; only, to deceive them, he would change some details of his
picture, and the title of it, without disturbing the general
composition.

Thus, it came before the jury once, under the name of "The Passage of
the Rubicon," but Pharaoh, badly disguised under the mantle of Caeser,
was recognized and rejected with all the honors due him. Next year,
Marcel threw a coat of white over the foreground, to imitate snow,
planted a fir tree in one corner, and dressing an Egyptian like a
grenadier of the Imperial Guard, christened his picture, "The Passage
of the Beresina."

But the jury had wiped its glasses that day, and were not to be duped by
this new stratagem. It recognized the pertinacious picture by a
thundering big pie-bald horse that was prancing on top of a wave of the
Red Sea. The skin of this horse served Marcel for all his experiments in
coloring; he used to call it, familiarly, his "synoptic table of fine
tones," because it reproduced the most varied combinations of color,
with the different plays of light and shade. Once again, however, the
jury could not find black balls enough to refuse "The Passage of
Beresina."

"Very well," said Marcel, "I thought so! Next year, I shall send it
under the title of 'The Passage of the Panoramas.'"

"They're going to be jolly caught--caught!"

sang Schaunard to a new air of his own composition; a terrible air, like
a gamut of thunder-claps, the accompaniment whereof was a terror to all
pianos within hearing.

"How can they refuse it, without all the vermilion of my Red Sea
mounting to their cheeks, and covering them with the blush of shame?"
ejaculated the artist, as he gazed on his picture. "When I think that
there is five hundred francs' worth of color there, and at least a
million of genius, without counting my lovely youth, now as bald as my
old hat! But they shan't get the better of me! Till my dying day, I will
send them my picture. It shall be engraved on their memories."

"The surest way of ever having it engraved," said Colline, in a
plaintive tone, and then added to himself, "very neat, that; I shall
repeat it in society!"

Marcel continued his imprecations, which Schaunard continued to put to
music.

"Ah they won't admit me! The government pays them, lodges them, and
gives them decorations, on purpose to refuse me once a year; every first
of March! I see their idea! I see it clearly! They want to make me burn
my brushes. They hope that