“I never see a sculptor make a human figure in clay without thinking of the creation of Adam and Eve,” the Signora said. “The Mohammedans say that angels first kneaded the clay for I don’t know how many years. How beautiful they must have been! ‘In His own image.’ Did you observe in the Barbarini gallery Domenichino’s picture of Adam and Eve driven out of Paradise? You were too much
occupied with the Cenci. Everybody is at first. I was thinking, while I looked at that representation of the Creator, reclining on his divan of cherubim, what a pity it is that artists should have tried to do it, or, trying, should not have been able to do more. How that eagle does fret! It requires all my friendship for Carlin to prevent my cutting the leather thong that holds the chain to its leg some fine day. Wouldn’t it be pleasant to see him shoot like a bomb out through the window, tearing the vines away like cobwebs with his strong wings, and carrying off little green tendrils clinging to his feathers! The sunlight would be shut out a moment, there would be a rush as of waters, then the room would be light again. But, in such an event, the only gain would be a change of personality in the prisoner, and thirty lire out of my pocket. That is what Carlin paid for this unhappy wretch, and what I should be bound to pay him to buy another unhappy wretch to languish in his place. How do you like Carlin?”
“I don’t know,” Bianca answered slowly. “Isn’t he a sort of savage?—a good one, you know.”
“Precisely! All the polish he has is inside. Fortunately, however, he is transparent, and the brightness is bright enough to shine out through him. He is full of good-nature and enthusiasm. Once liking him, you will like him always, and better and better always. None but dishonest people dislike him, though there are some very good people who say he is not to their taste. Dear me! he is making a mistake in that group. O Carlin!” she called out, “do let me say something. Your water-carrier is going to look like a teapot
if you place her so. Let her put the other arm out for a spout, and the thing will be perfect.”
It was a group of a girl and her lover at a fountain.
He was just knitting his brows over the hand that held the handle of the vase, rolling bits of clay between his palms and arranging them for fingers. He threw the last one away. “I know it’s a stupid thing,” he said discontentedly; “but what can I do? It struck me as a pretty subject; but now I have begun to work it out, it seems to me I remember having seen a hundred like it, each one as stupid as mine. I was this instant thinking my grandmother must have had a cream-pitcher of this design.”
“Why don’t you make her stooping a little to lift the vase to her head, and looking up at the fellow?” the Signora suggested. “It will bring out your knowledge of anatomy a little more, and it will wake her up. Don’t you see her face is as dull as her sandal?”
This conversation, being in English, was not understood by the model, who stood stupid, and straight, and tired, trying to look picturesque.
The artist considered a minute, then said abruptly: “Put down the vase, not on the floor, but in a chair.”