'abject rear' of this aesthetic dwelling.

Here was a garden, boasting a dwarf fountain (that never played) in the

centre, a few grimy-looking flowers in pots, two or three newly

planted trees which the spring of Chelsea visited without noticeable

consequence, and two or three statues after the antique, representing

satyrs and nymphs in the worst possible style of sculptured art. On one

side the garden was overshadowed by a pair of crazy studios, usually

hired out to the more obscure and youthful practitioners of British

art. Opposite these another lofty out-building, somewhat more carefully

finished, and boasting of a communication with the house and a private

door on the back lane, enshrined the multifarious industry of Mr Pitman.

All day, it is true, he was engaged in the work of education at a

seminary for young ladies; but the evenings at least were his own, and

these he would prolong far into the night, now dashing off 'A landscape

with waterfall' in oil, now a volunteer bust ('in marble', as he would

gently but proudly observe) of some public character, now stooping

his chisel to a mere 'nymph' for a gasbracket on a stair, sir', or a

life-size 'Infant Samuel' for a religious nursery. Mr Pitman had studied

in Paris, and he had studied in Rome, supplied with funds by a fond

parent who went subsequently bankrupt in consequence of a fall in

corsets; and though he was never thought to have the smallest modicum

of talent, it was at one time supposed that he had learned his business.

Eighteen years of what is called 'tuition' had relieved him of the

dangerous knowledge. His artist lodgers would sometimes reason with him;

they would point out to him how impossible it was to paint by gaslight,

101

The Wrong Box