to the atelier in the future, and of these, unless they have changed their names, no renown has come in later times.  There was a marquis whose income was one hundred francs a month, and a count whose father gave him five sous and a piece of bread for his breakfast when he left home, but the rest were plebeians, with neither past nor future, whose enthusiasm in the face of their weekly failures, and patience in following an arid path, were most interesting as a social phenomenon.  I have always found more to wonder at in the failures than in the great successes of artist life—­seeing the content and even happiness which some of the hopelessly enthusiastic found in their futile and endless labor.  We used to go to work at six in the morning, draw two hours and then go to a little laiterie and take our bowl of cafe au lait and a small loaf of bread, and then draw till noon, when we went home for the second breakfast.  Armitage and myself used to breakfast at the Palais Royal, or some other quarter where the bill of fare was by the rest of the men considered luxurious, and we were dubbed the “aristocrats” of the atelier, my breakfast costing me one franc and a half and my dinner two francs.  I had fixed my expenses, as in London, at the limit of twenty-five francs a week, which had to pay all the expenses of atelier, food, and lodging, and it was surprising how much comfort could then be got for that sum.

I had found a tiny room in the maison meublee in the Cite d’Antin where Mrs. Coxe lived, and Mr. Coxe in returning to America had given me charge of his women folk, so that I had a social resource and a relief from tedium which gave me no expense.  On Sunday the daughter came home from school, and we all went out to dine at one or another of the Palais Royal restaurants, or made, in the fine weather, an excursion into the environs.  Now and then, Mrs. Coxe invited me to take them to the theatre, and thus I saw some of the famous actors, Rachel and Frederic Lemaitre being still vividly impressed on my memory.  The afternoons of the week days were given to the galleries and visiting the studios of the painters whose work attracted me, and who admitted visitors.  I thus made the acquaintance of Delacroix, Gerome, Theodore Rousseau, and by a chance met Delaroche and Ingres; but Delacroix most interested me, and I made an application to him to be received as a pupil, which he in a most amiable manner refused, but he seemed interested in putting me on the right way and gave me such advice as was in the range of casual conversation.  I asked him what, in his mind, was the principal defect of modern art, as compared with ancient, and he replied “the execution.”  He had endeavored to remedy this in his own case by extensive copying of the old masters, and he showed me many of the copies—­passages of different works, apparently made with the object of catching the quality of execution.