poet; squeezed her to him. "Fancy you writing that for me! What a
sympathetic little soul you are--and how clever!"

Breathless she disengaged herself: "I'm so glad you like it. It's a
silly little thing--but it's _real_, isn't it? Come, there's father."

She paused against denial of the poem's silliness, affirmation of its
truth; but George, moody beneath Mr. Marrapit's eye, glinting behind
the window, had moved forward.

Margaret thrust the paper in her bosom, tucked in where heart might
warm against heart's child. Constantly during breakfast her mind
reverted to it, drummed its rare lines.




CHAPTER III.

Upon Modesty In Art: And Should Be Skipped.


Yet Margaret had called her poem silly. Here, then, was mock-modesty
by diffidence seeking praise. But this mock-modesty, which horribly
abounds to-day, is only natural product of that furious modesty which
has come to be expected in all the arts.

Modesty should have no place in true art. The author or the painter,
the poet or the composer should be impersonal to his work. That which
he creates is not his; it is a piece of the art to which he is