asking him to explain his troubles, he leaned across the table.

'Well, I'll tell yer. Yer be an eddicated man, and I likes to talk to them that 'as 'ad an eddication. Yer says, and werry truly, just now, that changing the stable don't change an 'orse into a hass, or a hass into an 'orse. That is werry true, most true, none but a eddicated man could 'ave made that 'ere hobservation. I likes yer for it. Give us yer 'and. The public just thinks too much of the stable, and not enough of what's inside. Leastways that's my experience of the public, and I 'ave been a-catering for the public ever since I was a growing lad—sides of bacon, ships on fire, good old ship on fire.... I knows the public. Yer don't follow me?'

'Not quite.'

'A moment, and I'll explain. You'll admit there's no blooming reason except the public's blooming hignorance why a man shouldn't do as good a picture on the pavement as on a piece of canvas, provided he 'ave the blooming genius. There is no doubt that with them 'ere chalks and a nice smooth stone that Raphael—I 'ave been to the National Gallery and 'ave studied 'is work, and werry fine some of it is, although I don't altogether hold—but that's another matter. What was I a-saying of? I remember,—that with them 'ere chalks, and a nice smooth stone, there's no reason why a masterpiece shouldn't be done. That's right, ain't it? I ask you, as a man of eddication, to say if that ain't right; as a representative of the Press, I asks you to say.' Hubert nodded, and the pale-eyed man continued. 'Well, that's what the public won't see, can't see. Raphael, says I, could 'ave done a masterpiece with them 'ere chalks and a nice smooth stone. But do yer think 'e 'd 'ave been allowed? Do yer think the perlice would 'ave stood it? Do yer think the public would 'ave stood him doing masterpieces on the pavement? I'd give 'im just one afternoon. Them boys would 'ave got 'im into trouble, just as they did me. Raphael would 'ave been told to wipe them out just as I was.'

The conversation paused; and, half amused, half frightened, Hubert considered the pale vague face, and he was struck by the scattered look of aspiration that wandered in the pale blue eyes.

'I'll tell you,' said the man, growing more excited, and leaning further across the table; 'I'll tell you, because I knows you for an eddicated man, and won't blab. S'pose yer thinks, like the rest of the world, that the chaps wot smears, for it ain't drawing, the pavement with bits of bacon, a ship on fire, and the regulation oysters, does them out of their own 'eads?' Hubert nodded. 'I'm not surprised that you do, all the world do, and the public chucks down its coppers to the poor hartist; but 'e aint no hartist, no more than is them 'ere boys that did for my show.' Leaning still further forward, he lowered his voice to a whisper. 'They learns it all by 'art; there is schools for the teaching of it down in Whitechapel. They can just do what they learns by 'art, not one of them could draw that 'ere chair or table from natur'; but I could. I 'ave an original talent. It was a long time afore I found out it was there,' he said, tapping his forehead; 'but it is there,' he said, fixing his eyes on Hubert, 'and when it is there they can't take it away—I mean my mates—though they do laugh at my ideas. They call me "the genius," for they don't believe in me, but I believe in myself, and they laughs best that laughs last.... I don't know,' he said, looking round him, his eyes full of reverie, 'that the public liked my fancy landscapes better than the ship on fire, but I said the public will come to them in time, and I continued my fancy landscapes. But one day in Trafalgar Square it came on to rain very 'eavy, and I went for shelter into the National Gallery. It was my fust visit, and I was struck all of a 'eap, and ever since I can 'ardly bring myself to go on with the drudgery of the piece of bacon, and the piece of cheese, with the mouse nibbling at it. And ever since my 'ead 'as been filled with other things, though for a long time I could not make exactly out what. I 'ave 'eard that that is always the case with men that 'as an idea—daresay you 'ave found it so yourself. So in my spare time I goes to the National to think it out, and in studying the pictures there I got wery interested in a chap called Hetty, and 'e do paint the female form divine. I says to myself, Why not go in for lovely woman? the public may not care for fancy landscapes, but the public allus likes a lovely woman, and, as well as being popular, lovely woman is 'igh 'art. So, after dinner hour, I sets to work, and sketches in a blue sea with three bathers, and two boxes, with the 'orse's head looking out from behind one of the boxes. For a fust attempt at the nude, I assure you—it ain't my way to blow my own trumpet, but I can say that the crowd that 'ere picture did draw was bigger than any that 'ad assembled about the bits o' bacon and ship-a-fire of all the other coves. 'Ad I been let alone, I should 'ave made my fortune, but the crowd was so big and the curiosity so great that it took the perlice all their time to keep the pavement from being blocked. It wasn't that the public didn't like it enough, it was that the public liked it too much, that was the reason of my misfortune.'

'What do you mean?' said Hubert.

'Well, yer see them boys was a-hawking their cheap toys in the neighbourhood, and when they got wind of my success they comes round to see, and they remains on account of the crowd. Pockets was picked, I don't say they wasn't, and the perlice turned rusty, and then a pious old gent comes along, and 'earing the remarks of them boys, which I admit wasn't nice, complains to the hauthorities, and I was put down! Now, what I wants to know is why my art should be made to suffer for the beastly-mindedness of them 'ere boys.'

Hubert admitted that there seemed to be an injustice somewhere, and asked the artist if he had never tried again.

'Try again? Should think I did. When once a man 'as tasted of 'igh art, he can't keep his blooming fingers out of it. It was impossible after the success of my bathers to go back to the bacon, so I thought I would circumvent the hauthorities. I goes to the National Gallery, makes a sketch, 'ere it is,' and after some fumbling in his breast pocket, he produced a greasy piece of paper, which he handed to Hubert. 'S'pose yer know the picture?' Hubert admitted that he did not. 'Well, that is a drawing from Gainsborough's celebrated picture of Medora a-washing of her feet.... But the perlice wouldn't 'ave it any more than my original, 'e said it was worse than the bathers at Margaret, and when I told the hignorant brute wot it was, 'e said he wanted no hargument, that 'e wouldn't 'ave it.'

Hubert had noticed, during the latter part of the narrative, a look of dubious cunning twinkling in the pale eyes; but now this look died away, and the eyes resumed their habitual look of vague reverie.

'I've been 'ad up before the Beak: from him I expected more enlightenment, but he, too, said 'e wouldn't 'ave it, and I got a month. But I'll beat them yet, the public is on my side, and if it worn't for them 'ere boys, I'd say that the public could be helevated. They calls me "the genius," and they is right.' Then something seemed to go out like a flame, the face grew dim, and changed expression. 'It is 'ere all right,' he said, no longer addressing Hubert, but speaking to himself, 'and since it is there, it must come out.'

IV

Hubert at last found himself obliged to write to Ford for an advance of money. But Ford replied that he would advance money only on the delivery of the completed manuscript. And the whole of one night, in a room hardly eight feet long, sitting on his bed, he strove to complete the