LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2714, 20 December 1882, Page 4

LITERATURE.

808 AND I—‘ARCADES AMBO.’ A Stoet op London Bohemia. in TWO PARTS. Part I. (i Continued .) And yet I know, and Bob knows, and I have dim suspicion that the keen eyed Amalekite seated on our table, and swinging his legs to and fro as he listens to our ‘ blarney,’ knows too, that my walls are covered with array of dust gathering ‘studies’ for which that Hebrew sceptic, old Moses, refuses to give me even the cost of paint and canvas. ‘ You might as well bring it over, eh?’ says Bob, after pausing long enough to let my last reply produce the proper impression on our intended victim. ‘ You would like to see it, wouldn’t you ?’ he continues, turning to his patron. ‘ Yea; I should like to see it,’ replies ho slowly. Again that curious, one-sided inward smile. He seems to be able to see a joke where no one else would think of looking for one.

‘ Well, I’ll go and bring it, if you really want to see it,’ I say lazily! as if the occasion demanded of me to make a sacrifice for politeness’ sake, hut that, personally, I should prefer staying where I was. ‘ls it far ? I’ll go around with you, if yon like,’ says Mr Capen. ‘Oh no,’ I reply hurriedly; ‘ my workroom is just on the other side of the landing,’ and I make haste out of the room. But as I close the door I again detect that abominable, uncalled for smile. I come back with the picture. Boh hurries the ‘Forest - Clearing’ out of the way, and I place my ‘ study ’ on the easel with a conscious pride. For a time nothing is spoken. Oln Steeve looks at the picture, and Bob and I look at Old Steeve.

It seems as if he finds the subject a little perplexing ; for he looks at it with) his head first on one side, then on another, while the corners of his mouth go up and clown. ‘ What d’ye call this ? D’ye give it a name ?’ he says at last, looking at me. ‘lt is “The Apotheosis of Helen”— replies Bob promptly, in my stead. ‘ Pothy whose’s ?’ ‘ No, no ; * The Apo-the-o-sis of Helen ’ — Helen added to the number of the gods.’

‘Oh, she’s bein/ made a god, is she ? Shouldn’t have guessed it. I suppose that was a long time ago !’ ‘ Yes ; thousands of years.’ ‘ And why do you make her a god ? What has she done? Was she a good woman ?’

‘ She betrayed two husbands, and caused the death of thousands of brave men. She brought ruiu on all who loved her,’ says Bob grimly. ‘ That so ? She seems to have been pretty bad ; and why is she made a god ?’ ‘ A goddess,’ suggests Boh. ‘ Jes’ so—a goddess ; why do you make her a goddess ?’ * Because of her great beauty. ’ ‘ Her what ?’

‘ Her great beauty ; do you not see it ? She was the most beautiful of women,’ says Bob gravely. Mr Capen turns again to the picture, and looks steadily at the deified Helen. Again that odious smile. After looking at it some time, he evidently concludes not to say anything more on the subject of Helen’s beauty. He tries another tack. ‘ It’s a small pictur’,’ he says, looking at

me. ‘ Yes, it is a small picture,’ I replied cheerily, as if that were a decided point in its favour. Perhaps he thinks so too ; for he turns jiway from me and looks at it again. * Don’t they never wear more clothes than that ?’ he says to Bob this time. ‘No, not usually,’ replies that youth, smiling. ‘Well, strikes me they must feel rather awkward when a stranger happens to drop in'j

* Oh no ; it was the custom then, and you kuow, habit is second nature.’ ‘More natur’ than habit here,’l guess,’ replies Mr Capon with a slight smile, the first I have ever seen on both sides of his face at once. We both laugh, as in duty bound. We feel we must humor our victim. Mr Capen looks on while we laugh, perfectly serious. ‘ And what’s the price of this pictur ?’ he says, when we have' done laughing. ‘Thirty pounds,’ 1 reply jauntily ; but Bob starts so violently that he tumbles off his stool.

Our visitor says nothing; but he looks at me in a way which makes me feel I am not any taller than I should like to be, and then at the picture again. ‘ It’s very small,’ ho says meditatively ; ‘ ’taint more’u half as big as the clearin’ there.’

‘ Pictures are not sold by the yard,’ I reply loftily. ‘lf you wore to buy one of Meissonior’s cavalry sketches, you would get a much smaller painting than this at a hundred times the price.’ ‘ Mobbe so,’ ho says quietly ; ‘ I ain’t a judge of pictur’s, I allow that. I guess most folks can lay over mo there. But say, is that your lowest figyurc ?’ Bob, who has been almost paralysed for the last two minutes at my coolness in comparing myself with Meissonier, recovers sufficiently to write twenty on a piece of paper which he hold up behind the back of our victim. But lam firm.

* Sir, I paint from a love of Art, and not from a desire for gain. Ido not offer you my picture—l simply name the price which it commands ; it is for you to take it if you choose. I may add, lam not dependent on my art. I have—er—an income of my own.’ I take out my handkerchief with a flourish, and apply it to my nose with a certain grace. Unseen by me, a yellow piece of cardboard falls from my pocket, and flutters to the ground. Mr Capon picks it up and reads : ‘Pawned with Dives and Lazarus, 8 Purgatory place, one gold watch and chain.’

Horror ! it is my pawn ticket! I dart forward, my cheeks burning. ‘ How dare you, sir ? I demand my property !’ He hands it to me silently, and looks coolly at me, while with quivering fingers I restore the wretched yellow card to my pocket. Then ho says quietly, ‘ I guess that’s rather thin about your independent income; bit of bunkum, eh ? But I guess it’s all right; all in the fair way of trade. And now, about this pictur’t I can’t say I’m real sweet on it ; it don’t quite suit me ; ’taint just what I’d like to put up in my parlor at home. But I guess it’s the right thing, and a good pictur’, eh, Mr Daly?’ ‘ It’s a splendid picture, ’ says Bob promptly, covering my confusion, ‘ And you think it ain’t dear at a hundred and fifty dollars.’ ‘ 0 no, not at all,’ replies my faithful and unblushing friend. ‘ Well, 1 guess you ought to know—you’re in the lino ; and I suppose youTo an impartial witness —you ain’t biassed ?’ * O no; not in the least,’ replies the brazen Bob.

‘Well, you mean well, auyway.' Then turning to me, ‘ Now, sir, look here. If I buy this paintin’ of you at your figyure, what’ll ye think I am ?’ I stammered out some inaudible reply, but Bob came to the rescue.

‘What will we think you are? Faith, a splendid patron, a judge of art, and the prince of: connoisseurs.’ ‘Just haul in your rope, young man, and let me get ’longside. The prince of what V * Of connoisseurs. ’ * Where’s that ?’

‘O, counnoisseurs mean people who know ; men who are judges.’ ‘ Why, you said that before ; you said I would be a judge of art. Don’t that ’cometwisted word mean any more than the other ?’

‘No ; just about the same.’ ‘Well, the other’ll do for me to push along with, I guess. Well, air, so that’s what you’d think, or rather whvt you’d say. If I was in your boots, d’ye know what I’d think ?’ ‘No ; what?’ ‘That I was a blamed fool.’

Perfect silence. As for Bob and me, our eyes instinctively seek the floor. ‘A blamed dunderheaded old fool,’ continued Mr Capen drily, finding apparently a certain pleasure in criticising himself tjxus severely, ‘to be let in by a couple of young chaps who don’t know as much life as his old boot, and let them palaver him out of a hundred and fifty dollars because they tell him he’s a jud*e of art and a—what’s the ’come-twisted name 7—a konnysoor. Yea, a Konnysoor.’ This last with biting sarcasm. ‘ Yes, sir, that’s what I should think; and I guess it’s what I’d say too.’ And looking at the determined jaw of Stephen P. Capen—Old Steeve—l had very little doubt but that he would say it. ‘ No, sir; if I buy this paintin’ of yours, I don’t buy it because I’m a judge of art, settin’ up a pictur’ gallery, and I want to git hold of somethin’ good in the paintin’ line. I buy it—well, I buy it ’cause I want to, not ’cause I want it. And now there’s your money, sir, and I guess you’d better throw in a frame. I’ll be back in the mornin’. ’

He laid the three ton-pound notes on the table, and was off before wo could recover, I from my shame and embarrassment, Bob from his astonishment. At last when the descending tread of our eccentric patron no long echoed on the stair, I turned to Bob, and we looked at each other in mute surprise. ‘.What do you make of this. Bob ?’ ‘ Faith, it beats me, Sandy. A chap who goes about like that with his pocket full of bank-notes, makes you look like a fool, and then gives you all you ask ! What the divil is he, anyway?’ * Do you think we ought to take his money. Bob ?’

‘Do I think, is it ?’ cried Bob, pouncing on the notes, and clapping them into the tobacco-box. ‘ I’ll tell ye what, Sandy, my boy ; if the old chap can’t take care of his money, it’s just as well he should give it to those that can.’

‘ I don’t think we took him in much. I don’t think he’s a fool.’ * A fool ? No, it’s we that looked like that. Never mind ; we’re on the right aide of the hedge now, and we'll keep there till quarter-day, please the pigs.’ ‘ I say, Bob, what do you think of him ?’ * I think he’s a regular Briton,’ cries Bob. * A what! What do you say ?’ ‘I say bless him ! for a queer, unvarnished, uncivilised, open-handed old jewel of an Amalekite.’ ‘ American.’ ‘No; Amalekite.’ Part 11. Our eccentric patron visited us, as he intimated, on the following morning. I verily believe ho came prepared to carry our pictures away with him there and then, and was considerably surprised when wo told him that the necessary work of varnishing, framing, &c., would take at least two or throe days. However, he was not disconcerted, and said he would look in now and again and see how we were getting on. It was, however, four days before the paintings were finally ready for removal. The delay was occasioned by Jenks, of whom, in our gratitude, wo had ordered such a magnificent pair of frames that the worthy carver and gilder was at considerable pains before he could execute our commissions satisfactorily. I remember that for my own theme, ‘The Apotheosis of Helen,’ I had instructed him to prepare a broad flat frame in dull gold, inlaid with a Greek pattern, to suit the subject, and at the foot was painted in black letters the name of the artist, with his- baptismal initial, thus : A. Macpheeson. I preferred the initial to the full name. It is my misfortune to have been christened—at an early age, without having any choice in the matter —Alexander; and the name, with its odious curtailment ‘ Sandy,’ is a a source of great grief to me. If I content myself with an A. the world, before whom my works will one day appear, may take it as standing for Arthur, Andrew, or perhaps even Archibald. O, had I but been christened Archibald.

Mr Capen came every day, and we soon got very intimate with him. For that matter there was certainly no stiffness on his side to be got over—on the contrary ; and now that we were accustomed to his cool ways they no longer annoyed us, in truth we were amused at them. He seemed to have

taken a fancy to us, and would spend a good part of the afternoon in Bob’s room, while we smoked and talked. He did most of the talking, and very good talk it was too, highly interesting to ns, who had never crossed the Atlantic in our lives. He seemed to take a certain pleasure in bringing out his richest anecdotes and most thrilling adventures for our delectation ; and at every visit his stories grew more and more wonderful, and, indeed, became little loss than marvellous. According to his own account, his life bad been one continued battle with Fortune. He had been almost everything ; had walked by the side of a team, run errands, driven a stage coach, pioneered immigrant trains, farmed a ranch, run a provision store, worked and owned a silver mine. He had wrested with the fickle goddess for more than fifty years ; and now, when his hair was gray and his face lined and wrinkled, he had conquered the adverse fates, and could sit down at his ease to watch the struggles of the rest, and hold out to them a helping hand. I felt a decided admiration for this hard-handed, clear-headed, queer-grained son of the West, and a great respect for the manner in which he had fought his uphill way through life ; but not the least desire to imitate him.

To he continued.