_Ethel_. "Isn't it sad, Arthur? There's the drawing-room cleared
for a dance, and all the dolls ready to begin, only they've got no
partners!"

_Arthur_. "Well, Ethel! There's the four gentlemen in my Noah's
Ark; but they don't look as if they cared very much about
_dancing_, you know!" (_February_ 24, 1872).

_Ethel_. "And O, Mamma, do you know as we were coming along we saw
a horrid woman with a red striped shawl drink something out of a
bottle, and then hand it to some men. I'm sure she was tipsy."

_Beatrice_ (who always looks on the best side of things). "Perhaps
it was only Castor Oil, after all!"

_A whispered appeal_. "Mamma! Mamma! don't scold him any more, it
makes the room so dark."

It is the _poetry_ of the nursery that is to be felt throughout du
Maurier's art in this vein. And how well he knows the emotions of
childhood. For instance, the large drawing "Farewell to Fair Normandy"
(October 2, 1880), extending across two full pages of _Punch_, in which
the children away for their seaside holiday leave the sands for the last
time in a mournful procession. The sky is dimmed with an evening cloud.
Du Maurier has compressed much poetry into the scene. It has been said
that "there is only one art," and this seems to be proved on great
occasions by those who can command more than one art for the expression
of their feelings. It is difficult to say where in this picture the
artist in du Maurier gives place to the poet, as difficult as it is to
say before a picture of Rossetti.