While the other children had been a torment and disgrace, Hubert had been
to his parents a consolation and a blessing. They had feared that he too
might turn to betting and drink, but he had never shown sign of low tastes.
He played no games, nor did he care for terriers or horses; but for books
and drawing, and long country walks. Immediately on hearing of his
disinheritance he had spoken at once of entering a profession; and for many
months this was the subject of consideration in the Rectory. Hubert joined
in these discussions willingly, but he could not bring himself to accept
the army or the bar. It was indeed only necessary to look at him to see
that neither soldier's tunic nor lawyer's wig was intended for him; and it
was nearly as clear that those earnest eyes, so intelligent and yet so
undetermined in their gaze, were not those of a doctor.

But if his eyes failed to predict his future, his hands told the story of
his life distinctly enough--those long, white, languid hands, what could
they mean but art? And very soon Hubert began to draw, evincing some
natural aptitude. Then an artist came into the neighbourhood, the two
became friends, and went together on a long sketching tour. Life in the
open air, the shade of the hedge, the glare of the highway, the meditation
of the field, the languor of the river-side, the contemplation of wooded
horizons, was what Hubert's pastoral nature was most fitted to enjoy; and,
for the sake of the life it afforded him, he pursued the calling of a
landscape painter long after he had begun to feel his desire turning in
another direction. When the landscape on the canvas seemed hopelessly
inadequate, he laid aside the brush for the pencil, and strove to interpret
the summer fields in verse. From verse he drifted into the article and the
short story, and from the story into the play. And it was in this last form
that he felt himself strongest, and various were the dramas and comedies
that he dreamed from year's end to year's end.