LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1881, 4 March 1880, Page 3

LITERATURE.

THE STONEMASON’S TRIUMPH. ( Continued .) * And the coloring ?’ said Miss Vane, with a despondent sigh. ‘ You painted these lights with a cloudy morning, and these with a clear sky.” ‘ Not that I am conscious of, and I tried to make the colors match.’

* But they would not be matched. You are not making bonnets when you sit down in the sacred name of art to depict nature.’

Miss Vane winced. She could not defend herself. She saw her weakness. Yet she was conscious of having done good work, and she felt that the critic had nnjnstly passed all that over in his eagerness to find fault. He might be the best artist iu the world, but he was unfeeling and uncharitable, and she wonld never ask his opinion again. These were the thoughts of the moment, that made her silent and dejected. The mason continued—

* These errors arise from yonr want of education ; from yonr youth (she remembered his speaking of her as a child) perhaps from your happiness.’ ‘ My happiness 1* "What has that to do with it ?’

‘ Much. Porrow makes poets, and onlypoets can paint pictures, except for “ordinary perceptions.” All these defects of color and drawing arise from your starting without an idea. You walk into this aisle, and you say : “ Oh, how pretty I this will make a nice picture. ” And after a long time you produce a thing that has not tha claim to respect that a photograph has—that at least tells the truth. Now, I’ll tell you how a poet would paint this picture. He would be filled, we will say, with melancholy, and upon his tempered mind would steal the memory of a cathedral aisle, gray and cold, and sad in tone, and the evening light slanting through an open door tells of a dying day, and heightens the pathos of the place. Here he conceives a grand picture, and he makes this cathedral the model by which to work out his conception; but he fixes the point of view whence his idea may be realised, and he is careful that the light shall be in harmony with his subject. A column will not get in the way of this man, and he will be conscious whether the sky is clouded or not.’

Miss Vane was silent for a time, feeling herself lower than the dilletanti dabbler she had sometimes feared herself to be—and without that hopeful gleam which generally accompanies self-depreciation. ‘ Then what had I better do with the picture ?’ she asked. • Cut it up. • 4 I might as well give it to Mrs Champ.’ * Much as I respect and like the estimable Martha, I could not counsel yon to be so generous. No, cut It up and keep it. There are a dozen pieces of excellent work here—most excellent. Keep them as studies. Only give Martha the coloured portion that yon tried to match. Here is a piece of masterly execution, and this is good indeed!’

He looked intently upon the work as he spoke. Miss V»no could not speak, being quite overcome with the delight the criticism afforded her. Noticing her silence, the mason said, his eyes still upon the painting—- ' I have discouraged yon.’ ‘ No, no ; oh dear, no I I am very grateful for your discriminating remarks j they are all true, quite true.’ * Especially the favorable ones, hey ?’ he asked, with a quiet laugh. Miss Yane thought she had never heard such a gentle and kind voice as this man’s, and his smile was as tender as a woman’s.

‘ No, I think I like your censure as well as your praise. It is that which makes the praise valuable. It will please me to out this picture up as you suggest. ’ ‘ And so your work here ends.’ There was the slightest tone of regret In his voice she thought, ‘Yon think I am too happy to feel the poetry of sadness ; you think I am a child. ’ * You are a child, and happily, not a pre cocions one, Your field of poetry lies outside these walls. The bright phases of nature, you could depict and impress them with all the joyful sunlight of a child’s nature —at least, I think so. looking at your face. Your eyes say that lam not old enough to have much experience of sadness. I am old enough—my life has been one of disappointment.’ ‘And must one experience disappointments to know what sadness is V she asked, looking at him with swimming eyes of sympathising sorrow. He penetrated her soul with his deepseeing eyes, searching there for the motive of her present grief, just as he had looked into her work for the feeling of the artist. ‘ All beautiful and good natures are capable of true sympathy with the sorrowful; but the sentiment is transient. Only our own sadness endures. Little as I have watched you, it has been sufficient to see the grave and gay expressions following each other in your face like the lights a:-.d shades upon an April hill. Deeper feelings will come soon enough. And now to my work.’ He left her standing still and silent by her easel, and began to chip the stones again. ‘ He does not know me, he does not know how deeply I feel,’ she thought as she slowly repacked the colors she was to use there no mere; and she believed it was sympathy with his misfortunes that alone made her wretched, but one-half of her dejection arose from regret upon her own account. There was nothing for her to do but to pack up and go, and slowly and reluctantly she finished her arrangements. When all was done, even to the buttoning of her gloves, she stepped up to the mason, intending to say something abont her gratitude for his valuable criticism, and add something more about the possibility of meeting him on some future occasion; but these society phrases went right out of her mind, and the society tone right out of her voice, as she looked iato the frank, ingenuous face and felt that she might never see him again, and so she said only : ‘ Good-bye.’

She held out her hand, and he took it without hesitation in his dirty palm, and met her sad eyes with his, so earnest and grave. ‘Good-bye, yon beautiful child, ’ he said. Had he taken her in his arms and kissed her, she would not have felt outraged, so high above her, so grand and pure did he look as he spoke. She walked away without another word. But his tools were silent 5 she felt he was following her with his eyes ; and she would have liked to turned round see him once more. 1 What, going already, Miss Vane?’ asked Mrs Champ, who was seated outside the cathedral door in the agreeable shade knitting. ‘ res. I shall walk home, and 1 will send for my things.’ * 1 am afeared that young fellow a been annoying you, miss ; yon look quite downhearted like.’ ' No, he has not annoyed me in the least, and my picture is finished.’ On her way home the reflection that she should see this strange man no more was uppermost in her thoughts, and all time looked blank and miserable before her. What should she do to-morrow, and the next

day, and the next ? How destitute of hope waa her life. Oh, now indeed she could paint her picture, and put Into it all that pathos he spoke of, and prove to him how deep her feelings were. Poor little goose I she had imagined all that feeling due to her sympathy with the mason’s unknown disappointments. Nevertheless, his influence upon her was lasting, and it seemed as though he had created in her that deeper sentiment which he prognosticated. She began to think, and perceptibly altered. She did not grow particularly wise in a fortnight ; but the desire to be true in everything that she did waa constantly hers. With this idea of truth she associated him—the mason—the man whose name even was unknown to her. And so he dwelt continually in her mind. She idealised him, making him her standard of excellence, and controlling her actions in the diraction she thought he would counsel. She did not get through much work, but what she effort id was conscientiously done. She wished to be a child no more, and behave childishly no longer, A favourite brush was missing from her box, and probably it had been left in the cathedral; but she would not go there to find it, lest he should suspect the dearer object of her search, and laugh at her weakness. Still, she hoped he would find it and bring it to her. He did find it ; but Mrs Champ waa the medium of its restoration. This brush—for to show this impulsive, natural girl as she was, her follies must be confessed—she had laid aside in her moat sacred of sacred corners, in company with a single glove for the right hand, carefully folded, black, almost new, but marked in white dust with the pressure of a hand. She insisted on Mrs Champ taking some refreshment, and, among other casual questions, asked if the mason still worked at the cathedral, and whether he had been more or less annoying of late. ‘He’s finished the job and gone, miss; ended the work last night. He was more quieter after your going, and spoke very pleasant to my sister, who’s got the gout, going out to the chemist’s himself to get a prescription made up for her as he’d got wrote down In that very sketch-book he’d drawed your face in, and wouldn’t take a farthing. However, I thought I’d give him a turn, seeing he was a good workman, though saucy—and I never knew a good workman yet as wasn’t faulty sometimes ! so I told him he might come and repair my sink in his spare time, and I’d pay him a fair price for the job ; so he came a.nd did it, and charged me a shilling for it, which I think was very reasonable, considering he took two bonrs over it, and swept the place up clean after him. Poor Miss Vane felt a little shudder run through her, hearing of her ideal artist mending a sink and taking a shilling for hts work, and then was vexed with herself for her repugnance to the man’s doing honest work. Mending sinks is mason’s work, and he never pretended to be more than a mason. The higher estimate of him was of her own working; she must get to think of him as a mason; he could never be more to her. She sighed, and asked no further questions, nor did she press Mrs Champ to stay when she had taken her refreshment.

Miss Vane bad aristocratic friends, and was not above the weakness of reverencing a title, and when she was pressed by Lady Emily Tipton to take a place in her carriage and accompany her party to a picnic in the Tipton woods, she consented; but in preparing her necessary toilet for the occasion she was afflicted with certain conscientious fangs, which grew as the day approached, n her heart she did not wish to go to the picnic, only her fear of displeasing Lady Tipton prevented her declining the invitation. Appealing to her imaginary counsellor, she heard him say she was wrong in accent leg a pleasure she had no sincere wish for. However, these graver thoughts were banished when she sat in Lady Tipton’s barouche, with an agreeable Sir Somebody at her side, and everybody around her gay and bright. Lsdy Tipton had complimented her on her bonnet, the agreeable Sir Somebody had complimented her bonnet on her, and not a sombre thought touched the heart of Miss Vane. The quick movement of the horses excited her; her eyes sparkled with pleasure; she looked the prettiest picture of happiness. They were driving along a lane, a narrow lane, where the horses were forced to slacken their pace to pass a foot passenger. He stood back as the carriage approached, and Miss Vane looking that way, saw that the pedestrian was her friend the mason, with a basket of tools in one hand, and a stone bottle in the other. She was utterly confused, and turned her eyes away as the carriage passed him. Shame filled her heart the very next moment, and she said quickly : (To be continued.')