He was presently called to a consultation, as he had been once or twice before, when Mr. Pye and the young artist he employed to design his frontispieces could not agree in any matter of taste that might be in question.
“I wish you would ask Mr. Craig,” observed Hester.
“So I would, my dear; but he does not know the story.”
“The story tells itself in the drawing, I hope,”[hope,”] replied Hester.
“Let me see,” said the curate. “O yes,[yes,] there is the horse galloping away, and the thrown young lady lying on the ground. The children who frightened the horse with their waving boughs are clambering over the stile, to get out of sight as fast as possible. The lady’s father is riding up at full speed, and her lover——”
“No, no; no lover,” cried Enoch, in a tone of satisfaction.
“Mr. Pye will not print any stories about lovers,” observed Hester, sorrowfully.
“It is against my principles, Sir, as in some sort a guardian of the youthful mind. This is the heroine’s brother, Sir; and I have no fault to find with him. But the young lady,—she is very much hurt, you know. It seems to me, now, that she looks too much as if she was thinking about those children, instead of being resigned. Suppose she was to lie at full length, instead of being half raised, and to have her hands clasped, and her eyes cast upwards.”
“But that would be just like the three last I have done,” objected Hester. “The mother on her death-bed, and the sister when she heard of the sailor-boy’s being drowned, and the blind beggar-woman,—you would have them all lying with their hands clasped and their eyes cast up, and all in black dresses, except the one in bed. Indeed they should not be all alike.”
So Mr. Craig thought. Moreover, if the young lady was amiable, it seemed to him to be quite in character that she should be looking after the frightened children, with concern for them in her countenance. Enoch waxed obstinate on being opposed. He must have the riding habit changed for a flowing black robe, and the whole attitude and expression of the figure altered to the pattern which possessed his imagination.