At some distance from the young girl's easel, sitting in a corner lighted up by a stray ray of sunshine, there was an old woman busily knitting,--probably the girl's mother, or protectress.

And besides those two, and the Englishman, and a lounging attendant wrapped in his cloak, there was no other soul in the gallery.
Yet the young student busily plied her task; nor was she surprised into looking up by the stopping of the stranger behind her chair.

He did not see her face, therefore; and it would be consequently unfair to imagine that any portion of the interest he could not help feeling in her was to be attributed to the ordinary charm of a pretty face, whereas it was really due partly to the artistic merit of her copy, partly to her bravery in sticking to her work despite the severity of the season, and partly to her youth and very apparent poverty.
Suddenly, as he watched the progress of her work slowly growing beneath the rapid movements of her slender, blue-cold fingers, the idea came into his mind that here might be a favourable opportunity of obtaining what he had much wished to procure when he had been at Ravenna,--some drawings of several of the most remarkable of the Mosaics in the churches of San Vitale and St.Apollinare in Classe.

He was quite satisfied from what he saw that the young artist was competent to execute the drawings he required.

The conscientious determination, which alone could have made her continue her work under such circumstances, was a guarantee to him that she would do her best.