l thinks.]

It is one thing to have a perfect costume, and another to understand
the role. Master Crewe not only looks his part, but he acts it as
well. He has not failed to take in all the points of the portrait, and
imitates the pompous attitude to perfection. He stands with feet wide
apart, grasping his gloves in the right hand and supporting the other
on the sash.

He is a bright boy, who enters into the spirit of the game, and it
tickles him hugely to play the part of a despot. But while he is Henry
VIII. in miniature, he is Henry VIII. without the king's coarseness,
and in the place is a child's innocent pleasure. It was no wonder that
his parents, delighted with the success of the costume, wished to have
a portrait made.

The boy is painted as he appeared when posing for his admiring
friends. In his effort to assume a lordly air his boyish glee gets the
better of him, and he belies the character by a broad grin. Perhaps he
has caught the twinkle in his father's eye, or his mother's suppressed
smile, and he can keep serious no longer. "Bravo!" cries the audience,
and he smiles in innocent delight at his success.

His pet dogs are in the room, and one of them is rather suspicious of
this strange young prince. He sniffs cautiously at his legs, for
though his eyes deceive him, his sense of smell cannot be mistaken.

Through a window in the rear we get a glimpse of the park beyond,
which adds much to the beauty of the picture. As we shall see in other
pictures of this collection[5] an interior gives a sense of
imprisonment unless it contains some opening. The mass of bright color
which the landscape makes in the upper right corner is balanced in the
lower left corner by a cloak thrown over a chair.

[Footnote 5: See Lady Cockburn and her Children, and the Duchess of
Devonshire and her Child.]

Reynolds painted so many fine portraits of boys that it is hard to say
that this or that one is best, though some have preferred Master Crewe
to all others.[6] We shall see by-and-by in Master Bunbury, and the
Cupid, that the painter understood boy nature pretty thoroughly. This
rollicking Master Crewe is not so serious as Master Bunbury, nor so
sly as the Cupid boy; he is in fact a typical English lad, sturdy,
masterful, frank, and good-natured.

[Footnote 6: Leslie and Taylor say that "none of his many admirable
boy pictures is so consummate."]

III

LADY COCKBURN AND HER CHILDREN

A pretty story is told