CHAPTER VII.

AT the commencement of the last chapter, Charles Gatty, artist, was going
to usher in a new state of things, true art, etc. Wales was to be painted
in Wales, not Poland Street.

He and five or six more youngsters were to be in the foremost files of
truth, and take the world by storm.

This was at two o'clock; it is now five; whereupon the posture of
affairs, the prospects of art, the face of the world, the nature of
things, are quite the reverse.

In the artist's room, on the floor, was a small child, whose movements,
and they were many, were viewed with huge dissatisfaction by Charles
Gatty, Esq. This personage, pencil in hand, sat slouching and morose,
looking gloomily at his intractable model.

Things were going on very badly; he had been waiting two hours for an
infantine pose as common as dirt, and the little viper would die first.

Out of doors everything was nothing, for the sun was obscured, and to all
appearance extinguished forever.

"Ah! Mr. Groove," cried he, to that worthy, who peeped in at that moment;
you are right, it is better to plow away upon canvas blindfold, as our
grandfathers--no, grandmothers--used, than to kill ourselves toiling
after such coy ladies as Nature and Truth."