painter in the present day, my friend's
resolution will appear extravagant, and
strangely at variance with the character
of prudence and economy I have ascribed to
him. To travel several thousand miles, at
a great expense, in search of materials for a
single picture, would seem a wild speculation,
indeed. But consider, what a picture
it will be when it comes home! It will be
worth a thousand pounds, to begin with;
whereas the artist's expenses during its
progress will not have exceeded three or four
hundred. Moreover, every sketch he may
have made in the mean time, every blade of
cactus or prickly pear sprouting up through
the hot sands of the Tierra Caliente; every
Jalapeña peasant girl with her scarlet petticoat
and Chinese-cripple satin shoes; every
silver-buttoned, slashed-trousered, sheepskin-
saddled ranchero, every ponchoed Indian,
every Zambo, pulque merchant,
watercarrier, priest, beggar, or hidalgo he may
transfer to canvas or paper in that glowing
land of a score of races, a thousand fashions,
and a myriad colours, will be a mine of
wealth to him. Mildmay Strong is much
more certain of coming home a rich man
than the most adventurous gold-hunter that
ever started for the diggings.

If Mildmay were to decide to-day on the
subject and treatment of a picture illustrating
the Arctic adventures of Sir John Ross, we
should find him to-morrow cheapening furs
at the Hudson's Bay warehouse, and laying
in a stock of the wholesomest preserved
meats at Fortnum and Mason's, On the
following day, by inquiring at his lodgings, we
should learn that his next address would be,
Number One, the North Pole.

It is by steady adherence to this system of
going directly to nature for all his subjects,that
Mildmay Strong, at the age of twenty-eight,
has been enabled to dictate hanging terms to
the Royal Academy, and to travel to Mexico
like a prince, in the mere pursuit of his calling.
But I remember the time when Mildmay
could not afford Mexico: Monmouthshire
even would have been beyond his reach.
He was fain, at that period, to content
himself with the humble pictorial resources of
Grayling, near Seven Oaks; an obscure
village on the road to nowhere, which might
have remained undiscovered to this day, but
for the adventurous spirit of a no less
enterprising Columbus than Mildmay Strong
himself. It happened in this wise:

Mildmay had spent some days, and even a
few shillings, in search of a Forest of Arden,
within a convenient distance from the metropolis.
He was then about to commence his
famous picture from As You Like It. Of
course, a real Forest of Arden was indispensable.
Mildmay wrote to us to say that, after
much fruitless wandering, he had found the
desideratum in the shape of a bit of primitive-
looking wood behind Grayling, where he had
already taken up his quarters, and where
he invited us to join him as soon as we
pleased.

By "us" I allude to a band of some half-
dozen unweaned Raphaels, to which I had
the honour of belonging (would I had never
since known worse company!) who possessed,
at least, the common merits of implicit faith
in Mildmay Strong, our acknowledged
leader, and prophetic conviction that he
would speedily become the great man the
world has since acknowledged him. We had
all artistic schemes of our own in abundance;
but felt a much stronger interest in the
progress of the As-You-Like-It picture, than in
that of any of our own conceptions.  It had
been agreed that, wherever Mildmay should
decide on pitching his tent for the autumn,
we should follow him in a body, and take for
ourselves such paint-pot luck as the
neighbouring scenery might offer. There was
much sincere hero-worship in this; but,
certainly, an equal amount of self-interest. The
fact was, we were none of us strong enough
to draw a line or mix a tint without Mildmay's
advice and countenance.

We took Grayling by storm on the following
day. Rather a formidable invading
party we were, and, I am bound to admit,
were by no means favourably received by the
inhabitants, at first: especially by the
boy and dog branches of the population. The
latter received us angrily: the former ironically:
for we wore queer hats and such beards
as we could grow at that early period of life.
But we had been accustomed to the more trying
ordeal of the London streets. So we ran the
gauntlet of the village bravely, till we reached
our leader's residence.

This, to our intense disgust, turned out to
be the most inconvenient looking, out-of-the-
way, tumble-down cottage in the
neighbourhood. We blushed for our chieftain's
quarters. We knocked at the humiliating
door, which was opened by the red-armed,
gaping, wide-mouthed, waddling country
wench, who laughed us to scorn in our
very teeth. The only answer to our
inquiries was by pointing to a step-ladder leading
to a hole in the kitchen ceiling. Having
performed this, she buried her face in a jack-
towel, and gave way to convulsions.

We ascended the step-ladder with considerable
risk, and with utter confiscation of
anything like dignity, and discovered Mildmay
Strong——

In an absolute cock-loft! A room that
boasted about half-a-knee's depth of wall,
with a wholly disproportionate quantity of
roof, in the gloomy heights of which the top
of an uncurtained bed was scarcely visible.
A worse room for a painter could not be
imagined. It was lighted by a single window
with lozenge panes.

Absolutely on the floor; crammed almost
against the glass; squatting on the floor,
Turk-fashion, sat our hero, our idol, with a
canvas on his knees, painting, with a serene