I sat by Cornelius, whose hand played idly with my hair; he stopped short to give his sister an astonished glance, then he shook his handsome head, and laughed gaily.
"Reject that picture, Kate!"
"He is his father all over," she sighed.
He smiled at her blindness, and turning to me, said—
"What do you say, Daisy?"
"They shan't reject it; they dare not," was my ready reply.
"It is too absurd to suppose such a thing, is it not?" he added, to teaze his sister, who disappointed him by unexpectedly veering round.
"Cornelius," she said, decisively, "your energy and decision in this matter give me more hope than your enthusiasm. I like a man to act for himself; but you must go on as you have begun, and give yourself up entirely. Will you be a student at the Royal Academy? Will you study under some great master? Will you travel? Speak, I have money."
"Thank you, Kate; I am glad you think I have acted rightly; but I have begun alone, and alone I must go on, with experience for my sole teacher. I must keep my originality."
Kate remonstrated, but Cornelius, once in the fortification of his originality, was not to be ejected thence.