ile a mirror in the brown depth behind them catches
the light. Another little girl presents herself, with abundant tresses
and slim legs, her hands behind her, quite to the left; and the
youngest, nearest to the spectator, sits on the floor and plays with her
doll. The naturalness of the composition, the loveliness of the complete
effect, the light, free' security of the execution, the sense it gives
us as of assimilated secrets and of instinct and knowledge playing
together--all this makes the picture as astonishing a work on the part
of a young man of twenty-six as the portrait of 1881 was astonishing on
the part of a young man of twenty-four.

It is these remarkable encounters that justify us in writing almost
prematurely of a career which is not yet half unfolded. Mr. Sargent is
sometimes accused of a want of "finish," but if finish means the last
word of expressiveness of touch, "The Hall with the Four Children," as
we may call it, may-stand as a permanent reference on this point. If the
picture of the Spanish dancer illustrates, as it seems to me to do, the
latent dangers of the Impressionist practice, so this finer performance
shows what victories it may achieve. And in relation to the latter I
must repeat what I said about the young lady with the flower, that this
is the sort of work which, when produced in youth, leads the attentive
spectator to ask unanswerable questions. He finds himself murmuring,
"Yes, but what is left?" and even wondering whether it be an advantage
to an artist to obtain early in life such possession of his means that
the struggle with them, discipline, _tatonnement_, cease to exist for
him. May not this breed an irresponsibility of cleverness, a wantonness,
an irreverence--what is vulgarly termed a "larkiness"--on the part of
the youthful genius who has, as it were, all his fortune in his pocket?
Such are the possibly superfluous broodings of those who are critical
even in their warmest admirations and who sometimes suspect that it may
be better for an artist to have a certain part of his property invested
in unsolved difficulties. When this is not the case, the question with
regard to his future simplifies itself somewhat portentously. "What will
he do with it?" we ask, meaning by the pronoun the sharp, completely
forged weapon. It becomes more purely a question of responsibility, and
we hold him altogether to a higher account. This is the case with Mr.
Sargent; he knows so much about the