the excitement of an almost
sleepless night, his tireless fancy still kept on working, and he was
engaged at this moment in transferring the little sketch of the second
picture to a sheet of the size of the first completed cartoon.

"You are, and always will be, a confirmed idealist," said Rossel, in a
low tone, without raising his eyes from Felix's sleeping figure.
"Instead of taking advantage of the opportunity and making some
splendid studies from real life here, you quietly work away at your
fables and turn your back on this fine specimen of Nature."

"I merely want to sketch in the outlines of the figures," the artist
responded. "It flashed across me, early this morning, to try whether
they will do on a large scale as well as in the sketch. I think, after
all, I shall have to shift this central group a little more to the
left, so as to give the whole more symmetry."

"Any stranger hearing you talk in this way, Kohle, my boy, would
suppose you were such an unsympathetic art-machine that even in the
midst of murder and violence you could think of nothing but your Venus.
But I know that with you it is merely an unconscious way of keeping up
your heart, just as Schnetz drank a glass of schnapps and I smoked a
chibouque after the first pull was over. Every one has a specific by
which he swears, and yours, moreover, is one of the sort that never
runs dry. But now, just come here and take a look at this model. After
all, these aristocratic families now and then produce some fine
specimens, turned out after the true _noblesse oblige_ principle. What
a neck and shoulders this youngster has! And just see, Kohle, how the
biceps stands out through his tight-fitting shirt-sleeves. A young
Achilles, _corpo di Bacco!_ Upon my word I should just like, now, in
this soft evening light, if I only had colors and canvas--"

"I can help you out with those," interrupted Kohle, also speaking in a
carefully suppressed voice. "I provided myself with a palette only
yesterday--old Katie wants to have her portrait painted for her
grandchild--I think the canvas--"

"Don't bother yourself about it, my good fellow. Perhaps, after all, it
is more sensible of me to study him with my eyes. But look, he tosses
about so often! And now again, it's fine the way the forehead is
rounded out, and then the splendid form of the brows. No wonder he has
good luck with the women; and that even that witch Zenz, who, as a
general thing, is as unapproachable