Presently, with an air of relief, he laid aside his palette and brushes; and turning to Mrs.Taine, with a smile, held out his hand.

"Come," he said, "tell me if I have done well or ill." "It is finished ?" she cried.

"I may see it ?" "It is all that I can do"-- he answered--"come." He led her to the easel, where they stood side by side before his work.
The picture, still fresh from the painter's brush, was a portrait of Mrs.
Taine--yet not a portrait.

Exquisite in coloring and in its harmony of tone and line, it betrayed in every careful detail--in every mark of the brush--the thoughtful, painstaking care--the thorough knowledge and highly trained skill of an artist who was, at least, master of his own technic.
But--if one might say so--the painting was more a picture than a portrait.
The face upon the canvas was the face of Mrs.Taine, indeed, in that the features were her features; but it was also the face of a sweetly modest Quaker Maid.

The too perfect, too well cared for face of the beautiful woman of the world was, on the canvas, given the charm of a natural unconscious loveliness.