Oswald.—Well, Edwin Lovel is not quite so much at a loss for drawing materials, for he has a cake of Indian ink and four camel's hair pencils. He draws with a pen beautiful title-pages, decorated with vignettes, for his copy-books and ciphering-books; and the boys pay him for ornamenting their writing-pieces. He was for a long time very unwilling to take money for those things, but we finally prevailed on him, though with great difficulty. He passes most of his evenings in drawing; that is, when he has any candle of his own, for he will not, even in the pursuit of his favourite gratification, cause the slightest additional expense to his parents, who find it very hard to live on his father's small salary.
Amelia.—What an excellent boy he must be.
Oswald.—Last Saturday afternoon, I thought I would go for him and take him to see some very fine pictures which were to be sold at auction on Monday. The door was opened by a half-grown black girl, (their only servant,) who was probably not accustomed to admitting visiters, and, therefore, knew no better than to show me at once up stairs to Edwin's chamber; a very small place, perfectly clean, but furnished in the most economical manner. There was no fire in the room. Edwin was sitting at a little pine table with his great coat on, and his feet enveloped in an old muff of his mother's to keep them warm. He was busily engaged in copying a head of Decatur from a China pitcher, improving on it so greatly as to make it a very fine drawing.
Amelia.—Poor fellow! had he nothing better to copy?
Oswald.—Why, I asked him that question, but he confessed that he was at so great a loss for models that he was glad to imitate any thing he could get; and that, having no instructer, he knew no better way to pick up a little knowledge of the general principles of the art, than by copying every thing that came in his way, provided it was not absolutely bad. I then reminded him that, as he could make admirable sketches from his own imagination, I thought he need not copy at all; but he disclaimed all pretensions to designing well, and then said that, even if his original attempts were tolerably successful, as outlines, it was only by drawing from prints or pictures that he could acquire a just idea of keeping, or of the distribution of light and shadow. He showed me, however, several original drawings, which my father would say evinced an extraordinary degree of talent, and some admirable copies, though many of them were taken from very coarse prints for want of better.
Amelia.—How very glad he would be to have this Souvenir to draw from.
Oswald.—He would, indeed. But that Souvenir cost three dollars, and I do not suppose that he ever had three dollars in his life, poor boy—I mean three dollars at once.
Amelia.—I will willingly lend it to him.
Oswald.—He has so little time to draw, that it would be a great while before he could return it; or rather, he would be so uneasy at keeping it long, that I know he would send it back before he had half done with it. And, besides, he would have no satisfaction in drawing from your book, as he would be in continual fear of dropping his brush on one of the leaves, or of accidentally injuring it in some way or other. He is very unwilling to borrow any thing that is new or valuable.
Amelia.—What a pity that a boy of so much genius should find any difficulties in his way.