and
folly in their minds as men. A small stove with a large pipe, which
described a fearful zigzag before it reached the upper regions of the
roof, was the necessary and infallible ornament of the room. A shelf
ran round the walls, on which were models in plaster, heterogeneously
placed, most of them covered with gray dust. Here and there, above this
shelf, a head of Niobe, hanging to a nail, presented her pose of woe; a
Venus smiled; a hand thrust itself forward like that of a pauper asking
alms; a few "ecorches," yellowed by smoke, looked like limbs snatched
over-night from a graveyard; besides these objects, pictures, drawings,
lay figures, frames without paintings, and paintings without frames
gave to this irregular apartment that studio physiognomy which is
distinguished for its singular jumble of ornament and bareness, poverty
and riches, care and neglect. The vast receptacle of an "atelier,"
where all seems small, even man, has something of the air of an Opera
"coulisse"; here lie ancient garments, gilded armor, fragments of
stuffs, machinery. And yet there is something mysteriously grand, like
thought, in it; genius and death are there; Diana and Apollo beside a
skull or skeleton, beauty and destruction, poesy and reality, colors
glowing in the shadows, often a whole drama, motionless and silent.
Strange symbol of an artist's head!

At the moment when this history begins, a brilliant July sun was
illuminating the studio, and two rays striking athwart it lengthwise,
traced diaphanous gold lines in which the dust was shimmering. A dozen
easels raised their sharp points like masts in a port. Several young
girls were animating the scene by the variety of their expressions,
their attitudes, and the differences in their toilets. The strong
shadows cast by the green serge curtains, arranged according to the
needs of each easel, produced a multitude of contrasts, and the piquant
effects of light and shade. This group was the prettiest of all the
pictures in the studio.

A fair young girl, very simply dressed, sat at some distance from her
companions, working bravely and seeming to be in dread of some mishap.
No one looked at her, or spoke to her; she was much the prettiest, the
most modest, and, apparently, the least rich among them. Two principal
groups, distinctly separated from each other, showed the presence of two
sets or cliques, two minds even here, in this studio, where one might
suppose that rank and fortune