blossomed into most unrepublican luxury. The ruler of the place
is an owl--an owl standing upon a skull and cross-bones, showing
forth grimly the wisdom of the man of letters and the end of his
hopes for immortality. The owl stands on the staircase, a statue
four feet high; is carved in the wood-work, flutters on the
frescoed ceiling, is stamped on the note-paper, and hangs on the
walls. He is an ancient and honorable bird. Under his wing 'twas
my privilege to meet with white men whose lives were not chained
down to routine of toil, who wrote magazine articles instead of
reading them hurriedly in the pauses of office-work, who painted
pictures instead of contenting themselves with cheap etchings
picked up at another man's sale of effects. Mine were all the
rights of social intercourse, craft by craft, that India,
stony-hearted step-mother of collectors, has swindled us out of.
Treading soft carpets and breathing the incense of superior
cigars, I wandered from room to room studying the paintings in
which the members of the club had caricatured themselves, their
associates, and their aims. There was a slick French audacity
about the workmanship of these men of toil unbending that went
straight to the heart of the beholder. And yet it was not
altogether French. A dry grimness of treatment, almost Dutch,
marked the difference. The men painted as they spoke--with
certainty. The club indulges in revelries which it calls
"jinks"--high and low, at intervals--and each of these gatherings
is faithfully portrayed in oils by hands that know their
business. In this club were no amateurs spoiling canvas, because
they fancied they could handle oils without knowledge of shadows
or anatomy--no gentleman of leisure ruining the temper of
publishers and an already ruined market with attempts to write
"because everybody writes something these days."