story of the painter who was asked by the
farmer whose cow he had been drawing, what the said picture might be
worth when finished, is typical.

[Illustration: "YER HAIN'T LAME, ARE YER?"]

"Oh, I hope to get thirty pounds for it if it is well hung," explained
the artist.

"Thutty pound for the mere picture!" cried the old fellow in
astonishment. "Why, I'd sell you the old cow itself for ten."

[Illustration: WHOSE COW HE HAD BEEN DRAWING.]

A spirit of commiseration underlies a good many of the remarks made by
the bucolic. I went down on one occasion to see a couple of painters who
had taken a small cottage at one and sixpence a week in order to paint
some orchard pictures. When their neighbours, who were farm hands, got
to know them a bit, they were very friendly disposed, and made them
presents of vegetables, and one old fellow who was reputed to have
"saved a smart bit o' money," said to one of the "painter chaps," as
they were called--

"There don't seem much of a living in your business, sir. I s'pose
trade's a bit dull with ye, now folks is a spring cleaning. What do yer
say now to paintin' my cart in yer dinner hour? I shall want it done
afore long, and I'd like to gie ye the job, for a shilling or two down't
come amiss to any of us. Do it now?"

[Illustration: "WHAT DO YOU SAY TO PAINTIN' MY CART?"]

Another job refused by these same artists was to clean and touch up an
old picture that had been bought for a few shillings at a sale. The old
chap who had purchased it went so far as to offer them a shilling to do
the work, and that offer being declined, he threw in a pint of stout as
an additional inducement.

A friend who had painted a 50 x 40 canvas outside during one summer,
spending some five or six weeks upon it, told me that one old chap,
who looked like a jobbing gardener, used to pass by every day, and
invariably stayed to stare at the work, but always at a respectful
distance, and it was not until the picture was nearly completed that
he broke the silence.

"D'yer moind me 'aving a look at it, sir?"

[Illustration: STAYED TO STARE AT THE WORK.]

"Oh, certainly not," and my friend got off his camp-stool to let the
critic have an uninterrupted view. The subject was a careful study of
wild flowers and herbage, growing in the corner of an orchard. The old
fellow seemed to take the picture in very carefully, and at length said:

"Is it a view in Ireland, sir?"

"View in Ireland! What made y