his moistened eyes once or twice before he answered, "Yes, wait a
moment, don't talk of fame yet. Bear with me. The sudden sight of you
unnerved me."

The artist here seated himself also on an old worm-eaten Gothic chest,
rumpling and chafing the golden or tinselled threads of the embroidered
silk, so rare and so time-worn, flung over the Gothic chest, so rare
also, and so worm-eaten.

Kenelm looked through half-closed lids at the artist, and his lips,
before slightly curved with a secret scorn, became gravely compressed.
In Melville's struggle to conceal emotion the strong man recognized a
strong man,--recognized, and yet only wondered; wondered how such a man,
to whom Lily had pledged her hand, could so soon after the loss of Lily
go on painting pictures, and care for any praise bestowed on a yard of
canvas.

In a very few minutes Melville recommenced conversation,--no more
reference to Lily than if she had never existed. "Yes, my last picture
has been indeed a success,--a reward complete, if tardy, for all the
bitterness of former struggles made in vain, for the galling sense of
injustice, the anguish of which only an artist knows, when unworthy
rivals are ranked before him.

"'Foes quick to blame, and friends afraid to praise.'

"True that I have still much to encounter; the cliques still seek to
disparage me, but between me and the cliques there stands at last the
giant form of the public, and at last critics of graver weight than the
cliques have deigned to accord to me a higher rank than even the public
yet acknowledge. Ah, Mr. Chillingly, you do not profess to be a judge of
paintings, but, excuse me, just look at this letter. I received it
only last night from the greatest connoisseur of my art, certainly in
England, perhaps in Europe." Here Melville drew, from the side-pocket
of his picturesque _moyen age_ surtout, a letter signed by a name
authoritative to all who, being painters themselves, acknowledge
authority in one who could no more paint a picture himself than Addison,
the ablest critic of the greatest poem modern Europe has produced, could
have written ten lines of the "Paradise Lost," and thrust the letter
into Kenelm's hand. Kenelm read it listlessly, with an increased
contempt for an artist who could so find in gratified vanity consolation
for the life gone from earth. But, listlessly as he read the letter, the
sincere and fervent enthusiasm of the laudatory contents impressed him,
and