began upon the purple smoke from the chimney of the distant
cottage of the proprietor of the golden harvest (which smoke was
beautifully soft), I found myself saying aloud, without considering of
it:

"Let that alone, will you?"

"Halloa!" said the man next me in the crowd, jerking me roughly from him
with his elbow, "why didn't you send a telegram? If we had known you was
coming, we'd have provided something better for you. You understand the
man's work better than he does himself, don't you? Have you made your
will? You're too clever to live long."

"Don't be hard upon the gentleman, sir," said the person in attendance on
the works of art, with a twinkle in his eye as he looked at me; "he may
chance to be an artist himself. If so, sir, he will have a
fellow-feeling with me, sir, when I"--he adapted his action to his words
as he went on, and gave a smart slap of his hands between each touch,
working himself all the time about and about the composition--"when I
lighten the bloom of my grapes--shade off the orange in my rainbow--dot
the i of my Britons--throw a yellow light into my cow-cum-_ber_--insinuate
another morsel of fat into my shoulder of mutton--dart another zigzag
flash of lightning at my ship in distress!"

He seemed to do this so neatly, and was so nimble about it, that the
halfpence came flying in.

"Thanks, generous public, thanks!" said the professor. "You will
stimulate me to further exertions. My name will be found in the list of
British Painters yet. I shall do better than this, with encouragement. I
shall indeed."

"You never can do better than that bunch of grapes," said Henrietta. "Oh,
Thomas, them grapes!"

"Not better than _that_, lady? I hope for the time when I shall paint
anything but your own bright eyes and lips equal to life."

"(Thomas, did you ever?) But it must take a long time, sir," said
Henrietta, blushing, "to paint equal to that."

"I was prenticed to it, miss," said the young man, smartly touching up
the composition--"prenticed to it in the caves of Spain and Portingale,
ever so long and two year over."

There was a laugh from the crowd; and a new man who had worked himself in
next me, said, "He's a smart chap, too; ain't he?"

"And what a eye!" exclaimed Henrietta softly.

"Ah! He need have a eye," said the man.

"Ah! He just need," was murmured among the crowd.

"He couldn't come that 'ere burning mountain without a eye," said the
man. He had got h