y eclipse Overbeck, and throw
Schadow for ever into the shade.'

'I fine you a supper,' said Lancelot, 'for that execrable attempt at
a pun.'

'Agreed! Here, Sabina, send to Covent Garden for huge nosegays, and
get out the best bottle of Burgundy. We will pass an evening worthy
of Horace, and with garlands and libations honour the muse of
painting.'

'Luxurious dog!' said Lancelot, 'with all your cant about poverty.'

As he spoke, the folding doors opened, and an exquisite little
brunette danced in from the inner room, in which, by the bye, had
been going on all the while a suspicious rustling, as of garments
hastily arranged. She was dressed gracefully in a loose French
morning-gown, down which Lancelot's eye glanced towards the little
foot, which, however, was now hidden in a tiny velvet slipper. The
artist's wife was a real beauty, though without a single perfect
feature, except a most delicious little mouth, a skin like velvet,
and clear brown eyes, from which beamed earnest simplicity and arch
good humour. She darted forward to her husband's friend, while her
rippling brown hair, fantastically arranged, fluttered about her
neck, and seizing Lancelot's hands successively in both of hers,
broke out in an accent prettily tinged with French,--

'Charming!--delightful! And so you are really going to turn
painter! And I have longed so to be introduced to you! Claude has
been raving about you these two years; you already seem to me the
oldest friend in the world. You must not go to Rome. We shall keep
you, Mr. Lancelot; positively you must come and live with us--we
shall be the happiest trio in London. I will make you so
comfortable: you must let me cater for you--cook for you.'

'And be my study sometimes?' said Lancelot, smiling.

'Ah,' she said, blushing, and shaking her pretty little fist at
Claude, 'that madcap! how he has betrayed me! When he is at his
easel, he is so in the seventh heaven, that he sees nothing, thinks
of nothing, but his own dreams.'

At this moment a heavy step sounded on the stairs, the door opened,
and there entered, to Lancelot's astonishment, the stranger who had
just puzzled him so much at his uncle's.

Claude rose reverentially, and came forward, but Sabina was
beforehand with him, and running up to her visitor, kissed his hand
again and again, almost kneeling to him.

'The dear master!' she cried; 'what a delightful surprise! we have