“Man, ye’re awfu’ common, whiles, Duffy,” said Erchie. “I’m fear’t I wasted my ticket on ye. This is no’ an ordinary show for haein’ fun at; it’s for enlargin’ the mind, openin’ the e’en to the beauties o’ nature, and sellin’ pictures.”
“Are they a’ for sale?” asked Duffy, looking with great intentness at a foggy impression by Sidaner, the French artist.
“No’ the hale o’ them; there’s some on lend.”
“I could hae lent them a topper,” said Duffy,—“faur aheid o’ onything here. It’s a drawin’ o’ a horse I yince had in my first lorry; it was pented for me by a penter that lodged above us, and had a great name for signboards. It cost me nearly a pound wan wye or anither, though I provided the pent mysel’.”
“Ay, Art’s a costly thing,” said Erchie. “Ye’ll seldom get a good picture under a pound. It’s no’ athegither the pent, it’s the layin’ o’t on by hand.”
“This yin’s done by hand onywye,” said Duffy, pointing to the foggy impression by Sidaner. “It’s awfu’ like as if somebody had done it themsel’s in their spare time.”
“You and me’s no’ judges o’ that sort o’ thing,” said Erchie. “Maybe it’s no’ near so bad as it looks.”
“Ye see,” Erchie went on, “Art pentin’s a tred by itsel’. There used to be hardly ony picture-penters in Gleska; it was a’ shipbuildin’ and calanderin’, whitever that is, and chemical works that needed big lums. When a Gleska man did a guid stroke o’ business on the Stock Exchange, or had money left him in thae days, and his wife wanted a present, he had his photy-graph ta’en big size, ile-coloured by hand. It was gey like him, the photygraph, and so everybody kent it wasna the rale Art. Folk got rich that quick in Gleska, and had sae much money to spend, that the photygraphers couldna keep up wi’ the’demand, and then the hand-pentin’ chaps began to open works in different pairts o’ the city. Ye’ll hardly gang into a hoose noo whaur ye’ll no’ see the guidman’s picture in ile, and it micht be bilin’ ile sometimes, judgin’ from the agony in his face.”
“My jove!” said Duffy, “is it sore to get done that wye?”
“Sore!” replied Erchie; “no, nor sore. At least, no’ that awfu’ sore. They wadna need to dae’t unless they liked. When maistly a’ the weel-aff Gleska folk had got their photygraphs done and then de’ed, the penters had to start the landscape brench o’ the business. Them’s landscapes a’ roon’ aboot”—and Erchie gave his arm a comprehensive sweep to suggest all the walls.