very dark little man, with a large bony forehead. He had seen,
strangely enough, such a bumpy forehead, and such narrow eyes in a
Florentine bust, and it was some satisfaction to him to see that
he was the typical Italian.

"If I had lived three hundred years ago," he said, "I should have
been one of Cellini's apprentices."

And yet he was the son of a Dublin builder! His father had never
himself thought to draw, but he had always taken an interest in
sculpture and painting, and he had said before Rodney was born
that he would like to have a son a sculptor. And he waited for the
little boy to show some signs of artistic aptitude. He pondered
every scribble the boy made, and scribbles that any child at the
same age could have done filled him with admiration. But when
Rodney was fourteen he remodelled some leaves that had failed to
please an important customer; and his father was overcome with
joy, and felt that his hopes were about to be realised. For the
customer, who professed a certain artistic knowledge, praised the
leaves that Rodney had designed, and soon after Rodney gave a
still further proof of his desire for art by telling his mother he
did not care to go to Mass, that Mass depressed him and made him
feel unhappy, and he had begged to be allowed to stay at home and
do some modelling. His father excused his son's want of religious
feeling on the ground that no one can think of two things at once,
and John was now bent on doing sculpture. He had converted a
little loft into a studio, and was at work there from dusk to
dusk, and his father used to steal up the ladder from time to time
to watch his son's progress. He used to say there was no doubt
that he had been forewarned, and his wife had to admit that it did