ly. I bowed to him with that inexorable politeness which
I first learned under the instructive fist of Gentleman Jones, and which
no force of adverse circumstances has ever availed to mitigate in after
life. Mr. Ishmael Pickup followed my lead. There is not the least need
to describe him--he was a Jew.

"Go into the front show-room, and look at the pictures, while I speak to
Mr. Pickup," said Dick, familiarly throwing open a door, and pushing me
into a kind of gallery beyond. I found myself quite alone, surrounded by
modern-antique pictures of all schools and sizes, of all degrees of dirt
and dullness, with all the names of all the famous Old Masters, from
Titian to Teniers, inscribed on their frames. A "pearly little gem," by
Claude, with a ticket marked "Sold" stuck into the frame, particularly
attracted my attention. It was Dick's last ten-pound job; and it did
credit to the youthful master's abilities as a workman-like maker of
Claudes.

I have been informed that, since the time of which I am writing, the
business of gentlemen of Mr. Pickup's class has rather fallen off,
and that there are dealers in pictures, nowadays, who are as just and
honorable men as can be found in any profession or calling, anywhere
under the sun. This change, which I report with sincerity and reflect on
with amazement, is, as I suspect, mainly the result of certain wholesale
modern improvements in the position of contemporary Art, which
have necessitated improvements and alterations in the business of
picture-dealing.

In my time, the encouragers of modern painting were limited in number
to a few noblemen and gentlemen of ancient lineage, who, in matters of
taste, at least, never presumed to think for themselves. They either
inherited or bought a gallery more or less full of old pictures. It was
as much a part of their education to put their faith in these on hearsay
evidence, as to put their faith in King, Lords and Commons. It was an
article of their creed to believe that the dead painters were the great
men, and that the more the living painters imitated the dead, the better
was their chance of becoming at some future day, and in a minor degree,
great also. At certain times and seasons, these noblemen and gentlemen
self-distrustfully strayed into the painting-room of a modern artist,
self-distrustfully allowed themselves to be rather attracted by his
pictures, self-distrustfully bought one or two of them at prices which
would appear s