FOOTNOTES:
[2] I speak, of course, only of the discreet poet. Great poets are never discreet. Their genius overrides their discretion.
BULLS AND BEARS.
CHAPTER I
THE ARTISTS' EXHIBITION, AND WHAT CAME OF IT.
There was an exhibition of pictures in an upper room on Washington Street. The artists had collected their unsold productions, and proposed to offer them at auction. There were sketches of White Mountain scenery, views of Nahant and other beaches, woodland prospects, farm-houses with well-sweeps, reedy marshes and ponds, together with the usual variety of ideal heads and figures,—a very pretty collection. The artists had gone forth like bees, and gathered whatever was sweetest in every field through a wide circuit, and now the lover of the beautiful might have his choice of the results without the fatigue of travel. Defects enough there were to critical eyes,—false drawing, cold color, and unsuccessful distances; still there was much to admire, and the spirit and intention were interesting, even where the inexperience of the painter was only too apparent.
A group of visitors entered the room: a lady in the prime of beauty, richly but modestly dressed, casting quick glances on all sides, yet with an air of quiet self-possession; a gentleman, her brother apparently, near forty years of age, dignified and prepossessing; a second lady, in widow's weeds; and a young gentleman with successful moustaches, lemon-colored gloves, and one of those bagging coats which just miss the grace of flowing outline without the compensation of setting off a good figure. The lady first mentioned seemed born to take the lead; it was no assumption in her; incedo regina was the expression of her gracefully poised head and her stately carriage. "A pretty bit," she said, carelessly pointing with her parasol to a picture of a rude country bridge and dam.
"Yes," said her elder brother, "spirited and lifelike. Who is the painter, Marcia?"
The beauty consulted her catalogue.