up the manuscript.

"Frankly, your success is by no means complete," replied she. "It is
true, I have an idea of the character you endeavor to describe; but
it is rather by dint of my own thought than your expression."

"That is unavoidable," observed the sculptor, "because the
characteristics are all negative. If Gervayse Hastings could have
imbibed one human grief at the gloomy banquet, the task of
describing him would have been infinitely easier. Of such persons--
and we do meet with these moral monsters now and then--it is
difficult to conceive how they came to exist here, or what there is
in them capable of existence hereafter. They seem to be on the
outside of everything; and nothing wearies the soul more than an
attempt to comprehend them within its grasp."