ning with all attention, promising himself to
remember every word of the spoken essay on art, with the view of
producing it as his own at the first favourable opportunity. And he
generally did, to his own discomfiture and the amusement of his hearers,
who, if they happened to know Delacroix, which was the case frequently,
invariably detected the source of the speaker's information. I once
heard a spoken essay on Holbein reproduced in that way, which would have
simply made the fortune of any comic writer. The human parrot had not
even been parrot-like, for he had muddled the whole in transmission. I
took some pains to reproduce his exact words, and I never saw Delacroix
laugh as when I repeated it to him. For, as a rule, and even when he was
mystifying that kind of numskull in the presence of half a dozen
well-informed friends, Delacroix remained perfectly serious, though the
others had to bite their lips lest they should explode. In fact, it
would have been difficult at any time to guess or discover, beneath the
well-bred man of the world, with his charming, courtly, though somewhat
distant manner, the painter who gave us "La Barque de Dante," and "Les
Massacres de Scio;" still, Delacroix was that man of the world,
exceedingly careful of his appearance, particular to a degree about his
nails, which he wore very long, dressed to perfection, and, in spite of
the episode with George Sand, recorded above, most ingratiating with
women.

Different altogether was he in his studio. Though he was "at home" from
three till five, to visitors of both sexes, it was distinctly understood
that he would not interrupt his work for them, or play the host as the
popular painter of to-day is supposed to do. The atelier, encumbered
with bric-a-brac and sumptuous hangings and afternoon tea, had not been
invented: if the host wore a velvet coat, a Byronic collar, and gorgeous
papooshes, it was because he liked these things himself, not because he
intended to impress his visitors. As a rule, the host, though in his
youth perhaps he had been fond of extravagant costumes, did not like
them: Horace Vernet often worked in his shirt-sleeves, Paul Delaroche
nearly always wore a blouse, and Ingres, until he became "a society
man," which was very late in life, donned a dressing-gown. Delacroix
was, if anything, more slovenly than the rest when at work. An old
jacket buttoned up to the chin, a large muffler round his neck, a cloth
cap pulled over his e