VANCE--"Her cotton print! I see it still before me! But I must not be
ungrateful. Would you believe it,--that little portrait, which cost me
three pounds, has made, I don't say my fortune, but my fashion?"

LIONEL--"How! You had the heart to sell it?"

VANCE.--"No; I kept it as a study for young female heads--'with
variations,' as they say in music. It was by my female heads that I
became the fashion; every order I have contains the condition, 'But be
sure, one of your sweet female heads, Mr. Vance.' My female heads are as
necessary to my canvas as a white horse to Wouvermans'. Well, that
child, who cost me three pounds, is the original of them all. Commencing
as a Titania, she has been in turns a 'Psyche,' a 'Beatrice-Cenci,'
a 'Minna,' 'A Portrait of a Nobleman's Daughter,' 'Burns's Mary in
Heaven,' 'The Young Gleaner,' and 'Sabrina Fair,' in Milton's 'Comus.'
I have led that child through all history, sacred and profane. I have
painted her in all costumes (her own cotton print excepted). My female
heads are my glory; even the 'Times' critic allows that! 'Mr. Vance,
there, is inimitable! a type of childlike grace peculiarly his own,' etc.
I'll lend you the article."

LIONEL.--"And shall we never again see the original darling Sophy? You
will laugh, Vance, but I have been heartproof against all young ladies.
If ever I marry, my wife must have Sophy's eyes! In America!"

VANCE.--"Let us hope by this time happily married to a Yankee! Yankees
marry girls in their teens, and don't ask for dowries. Married to a
Yankee! not a doubt of it! a Yankee who thaws, whittles, and keeps a
'store'!"