What do you think?"

"I don't see any purple at all in the real grass," he said.

"There is purple there, however; but of course, you, not being an
artist, cannot see it." She laughed a little for fear he might think her
pronouncement harsh.

"What--what is an artist?"

"An artist is one who has learned to see more than other people can in
the common things about them."

The definition was not quite clear to him. He had proved that he
could see farther and clearer than she could when looking at trees or
chipmunks. He looked critically again at the picture.

"I mean, of course," she added, as she noted his puzzled look, "that an
artist is one who sees in nature the beauty in form, in light and shade,
and in color."

"You haven't put that tree in the right place," he objected! "and you
have left out that house altogether."

"This is not a photograph," she answered. "I put in my picture only that
which I want there. The tree isn't in the right place, so I moved it.
The house has no business in the picture because I want it to represent
a scene of wild, open lonesomeness. I want to make the people who look
at it feel so lonesome that they want to cry!"