you are so engaged. You must give your
heart and soul to it, Gerty; you must forget yourself; you must abandon
yourself to it, and let it grow up in your mind until the conception is
so perfect that there are no traces of the manner of its production
left."

He certainly was addressing his daughter, but somehow the formal phrases
suggested that he was speaking for the benefit of the stranger. The prim
old gentleman continued; "That is the only way. Art demands absolute
self-forgetfulness. You must give yourself to it in complete surrender.
People may not know the difference; but the true artist seeks only to be
true to himself. You produce the perfect flower; they are not to know of
the anxious care--of the agony of tears, perhaps you have spent on it.
But then your whole mind must be given to it; there must be no
distracting cares; I will look for the missing lines myself."

"I am quite sure, papa," said Miss Carry, spitefully, "that she was far
more anxious about these cutlets than about her new part this morning.
She was half a dozen times to the kitchen. I didn't see her reading the
book much."

"The _res angustae domi_," said the father, sententiously, "sometimes
interfere, where people are not too well off. But that is necessary.
What is not necessary is that Gerty should take my troubles over to
herself, and disturb her formation of this new character, which ought to
be growing up in her mind almost insensibly, until she herself will
scarcely be aware how real it is. When she steps on to the stage she
ought to be no more Gertrude White than you or I. The artist loses
himself. He transfers his soul to his creation. His heart beats in
another breast; he sees with other eyes. You will excuse me, Sir Keith,
but I keep insisting on this point to my daughter. If she ever becomes a
great artist, that will be the secret of her success. And she ought
never to cease from cultivating the habit. She ought to be ready at any
moment to project herself, as it were, into any character. She ought to
practise so as to make of her own emotions an instrument that she can
use at will. It is a great demand that art makes on the life of an
artist. In fact, he ceases to live for himself. He becomes merely a
medium. His most secret experiences are the property of the world at
large, once they have been transfused and moulded by his personal
skill."

And so he continued talking, apparently for the instruction of his
daughter, but al