me. It was entitled
"Lords of our Life and Death." Surrounded by rolling masses of cloud,
some silver-crested, some shot through with red flame, was depicted the
World, as a globe half in light, half in shade. Poised above it was a
great Angel, upon whose calm and noble face rested a mingled expression
of deep sorrow, yearning pity, and infinite regret. Tears seemed to
glitter on the drooping lashes of this sweet yet stern Spirit; and in
his strong right hand he held a drawn sword--the sword of
destruction--pointed forever downwards to the fated globe at his feet.
Beneath this Angel and the world he dominated was darkness--utter
illimitable darkness. But above him the clouds were torn asunder, and
through a transparent veil of light golden mist, a face of surpassing
beauty was seen--a face on which youth, health, hope, love, and
ecstatic joy all shone with ineffable radiance. It was the
personification of Life--not life as we know it, brief and full of
care--but Life Immortal and Love Triumphant. Often and often I found
myself standing before this masterpiece of Cellini's genius, gazing at
it, not only with admiration, but with a sense of actual comfort. One
afternoon, while resting in my favourite low chair opposite the
picture, I roused myself from a reverie, and turning to the artist, who
was showing some water-colour sketches to Mrs. Everard, I said abruptly:

"Did you imagine that face of the Angel of Life, Signor Cellini, or had
you a model to copy from?"

He looked at me and smiled.

"It is a moderately good portrait of an existing original," he said.

"A woman's face then, I suppose? How very beautiful she must be!"

"Actual beauty is sexless," he replied, and was silent. The expression
of his face had become abstracted and dreamy, and he turned over the
sketches for Mrs. Everard with an air which showed his thoughts to be
far away from his occupation.

"And the Death Angel?" I went on. "Had you a model for that also?"

This time a look of relief, almost of gladness, passed over his
features.

"No indeed," he answered with ready frankness; "that is entirely my own
creation."

I was about to compliment him on the grandeur and force of his poetical
fancy, when he stopped me by a slight gesture of his hand.

"If you really admire the picture," he said, "pray do not say so. If it
is in truth a work of art, let it speak to you as art only, and spare
the poor workman who has called it into existence the s