me. You'll have to do it tonight, for I'm off to-morrow. Old Ivory and I
have shot so much game we've grown squeamish about it, but it seems
there's a terrific drought and famine on in the game country of the East
Coast, and all the reserves have been thrown open. The idea is meat for
the natives and a thinning out of game in the overstocked country. We
are going out this time not as murderers, but as philanthropists."

"I'd like to go, too," said Lewis, his eyes lighting. "Won't you let
me?"

"Not this trip, my boy," said Leighton. "I hate to refuse you anything,
but don't think I'm robbing you. I'm not. I merely don't wish you to eat
life too fast. Times will come when you'll _need_ to go away. Just now
you've got things enough to hunt right here. One of them is art. You may
think you've arrived, but you haven't--not yet."

"I know I haven't," said Lewis.

Leighton nodded.

"Ever heard this sort of thing? 'Art is giving something for nothing.
Art is the ensnaring of beauty in an invisible mesh. Art is the ideal of
common things. Art is a mirage stolen from the heavens and trapped on a
bit of canvas or on a sheet of paper or in a lump of clay.' And so on
and so on."

Lewis smiled.

"As a matter of fact," continued Leighton, "those things are merely the
progeny of art. Art itself is work, and its chief end is expression with