r
drawing of one of the Doctor's babies, when the family at the Rectory
were in London for a season, and this drawing had been shown to all the
neighbors by the worthy clergyman on his return. Now, although Mr. Blyth
was not over-successful in the adult department of portrait-art, he was
invariably victorious in the infant department. He painted all babies
on one ingenious plan; giving them the roundest eyes, the chubbiest
red cheeks, the most serenely good-humored smiles, and the neatest
and whitest caps ever seen on paper. If fathers and their male friends
rarely appreciated the fidelity of his likenesses, mothers and nurses
invariably made amends for their want of taste. It followed, therefore,
almost as a matter of course, that the local exhibition of the Doctor's
drawing must bring offers of long-clothes-portrait employment to
Valentine. Three resident families decided immediately to have portraits
of their babies, if the painter would only travel to their houses to
take the likenesses. A bachelor sporting squire in the neighborhood also
volunteered a commission of another sort. This gentleman arrived (by
a logical process which it is hopeless to think of tracing) at the
conclusion, that a man who was great at babies, must necessarily be
marvelous at horses; and determined, in consequence, that Valentine
should paint his celebrated cover-hack. In writing to inform his friend
of these offers, Doctor Joyce added another professional order on his
own account, by way of appropriate conclusion to his letter. Here, then,
were five commissions, which would produce enough--cheaply as Valentine
worked--to pay, not only for the new bookcase, but for the books to put
in it when it came home.

Having left his wife in charge of two of her sisters, who were forbidden
to leave the house till his return, Mr. Blyth started for the rectory;
and once there, set to work on the babies with a zeal and good-humor
which straightway won the hearts of mothers and nurses, and made him a
great Rubbleford reputation in the course of a few days. Having done the
babies to admiration, he next undertook the bachelor squire's hack. Here
he had some trouble. The sporting gentleman would look over him while he
painted; would bewilder him with the pedigree of the horse; would have
the animal done in the most unpicturesque view; and sternly forbade
all introduction of "tone," "light and shade," or purely artistic
embellishment of any kind, in any part