resembles a gardener's boy. Who made it?"

"My pupil, Ulrich Navarrete."

"How long has he been painting?"

"For several months, Sire."

"And you think he will be an artist of note?"

"Perhaps so. In many respects he surpasses my expectations, in others he
falls below them. He is a strange fellow."

"He is ambitious, at any rate."

"No small matter for the future artist. What he eagerly begins has a
very grand and promising aspect; but it shrinks in the execution. His
mind seizes and appropriates what he desires to represent, at a single
hasty grasp...."

"Rather too vehement, I should think."

"No fault at his age. What he possesses makes me less anxious, than what
he lacks. I cannot yet discover the thoughtful artist-spirit in him."

"You mean the spirit, that refines what it has once taken, and in quiet
meditation arranges lines, and assigns each color to its proper place, in
short your own art-spirit."

"And yours also, Sire. If you had begun to paint early, you would have