“I thought he painted such romantic pictures,” said I to Afra as we turned from the master.

“So he does:  there is one in his studio now.  A girl clad in gray and shadow—­open-air shade which in his hands is so clear and luminous.  She walks along a garden-path, her head bent down, dreaming as she goes, and unconsciously nearing a half-open gateway, through which the sunshine is streaming.  Above the rustic gate two doves are billing and cooing.  You feel sure the girl is about to pass through this typical, sunshiny, invitingly half-open door; and—­what is beyond?”

Just then we were called to lunch, a plentiful but not luxurious repast.  There was no lack of lively repartees and anecdotes, and we had speeches and songs afterward.  I wonder if I ever heard “’Tis better to laugh than be sighing” given with more zest than on that day?  One could easily imagine that it was such an occasion as this that had inspired it.

Lunch being over, Monsieur C——­ was asked to relate one of his own stories.  I cannot give it entire, but the plot was this:  A pilgrim, whom he called poor Jacques, hearing much of heaven, set out to find his way to the blessed abode, with only a little dog to accompany him on the journey.  As he went he met many of his contemporaries, who had made what a walker would style but poor time.  The allusions to well-known peculiarities in the various people and their occupation in the other life caused much amusement.  For instance, Ingres the painter was seated by the roadside playing Rossini’s music on the violin, on which instrument he was a great proficient.  But he was known to detest the Italian’s music before he started heavenward:  his taste must then have grown en route. (Critics might object to this supposition.) However, Jacques was anxious to push on, and spent little time listening.  But he was a good-hearted man, and, though he would not delay for his own amusement, he could not refuse to stop when fellow-pilgrims asked him for assistance.  Little children were continually straying from the path, and without Jacques and his little dog would inevitably have been lost.  Feeble old people were standing looking with despair at some obstacle that without Jacques’s friendly arm they would have found it impossible to pass.  Young men who never looked where they were walking were continually calling on him for a hand to help them out of the ditch where they had fallen; and young girls—­well, one would have supposed they had never been given feet of their own to walk with, from the trouble they were to poor Jacques.  The worst of it was, that when all these good people were well over their troubles they called Jacques a simpleton for his pains, and refused to have any intercourse with him, giving him the worst side of the road and laughing at his old-fashioned staff and scrip, and even at his little dog, to which they gave many a sly kick.  Nor was it any wonder, for there were many in the company robed in silk, wearing precious stones and with well-filled wallets by their sides.  Jacques was but human, and often he wished he had never set out for heaven at all in such company; but even in their bitterest moods neither Jacques nor the little dog could ever hear a cry of distress without forgetting all unkindness and rushing at once to the rescue.