"Come back to common sense," said the old lady, coldly and grimly.

He looked uneasy. Common sense had often been quoted against him, and
common sense had always proved right.

"Come back to common sense. She shall not be your mistress, and she
cannot bear your name; you must part some day, because you cannot come
together, and now is the best time."

"Not be together? all our lives, all our lives, ay," cried he, rising
into enthusiasm, "hundreds of years to come will we two be together
before men's eyes--I will be an immortal painter, that the world and time
may cherish the features I have loved. I love her, mother," added he,
with a tearful tenderness that ought to have reached a woman's heart;
then flushing, trembling, and inspired, he burst out, "And I wish I was a
sculptor and a poet too, that Christie might live in stone and verse, as
well as colors, and all who love an art might say, 'This woman cannot
die, Charles Gatty loved her.'"

He looked in her face; he could not believe any creature could be
insensible to his love, and persist to rob him of it.

The old woman paused, to let his eloquence evaporate.

The pause chilled him; then gently and slowly, but emphatically, she
spoke to him thus:

"Who has kept you on her small means ever since you were ten years and
seven months old?"