the figure in the doorway was too sketchy.  Not so our enthusiast.  This was the Prodigal Son, and as for the bending, forgiving father, all that he could imagine of forgiveness and pity was there realised in a few scratches of the needle.  He turned the prints and withdrew Tobit Blind.  In every line of this figure of the wandering old man, tapping his stick upon the pavement, feeling his way by the wall, was blindness, actual blindness—­all the misery and loneliness and indignity of it.

“Are these for sale?” he asked the smiling proprietor, without the slightest hope that he could afford one.

“Oh yes! Tobit Blind you can have for two shillings and sixpence. Abraham’s Sacrifice, Christ at Emmaus, and The Prodigal Son are four shillings each.”

The enthusiast could not conceal his astonishment.  “I thought Rembrandt’s etchings cost hundreds of pounds,” he said.

“They do, but these are merely reproductions.  Only a millionaire could hope to possess a complete collection of first states.  These are the reproductions that were issued with M. Blanc’s catalogue.  He made them from the best proofs in his own collections, and from the public museums.  You should compare them with the originals.  The difference will astonish you.  It’s candle-light to sunlight, satinette to the finest silk.”

“But where can I see the originals?  I don’t know any millionaires.”

“Nothing easier!  Go to the Print Room of the British Museum or to the Ionides Collection.”

A day or two later the enthusiast, carrying under his arm the roll of four Rembrandt’s etchings that he had purchased for fourteen shillings and sixpence, ascended the stairs of the British Museum, and timidly opened the door marked, “Print Room.  Students only.”

His reception agreeably surprised him.  He, an obscure person, was treated as if he were a M. Michel.  An obliging boy requested him to hang his hat and coat upon a peg, and to sign his name in a book.  An obliging youth waved him to a noble desk running at a right angle to a noble window, and begged him to indicate his needs upon a slip of paper.  He inscribed the printed form with the words—­“Rembrandt’s Etchings and Drawings.”

The obliging youth scanned the document and said—­“Which do you wish to see?  There are many portfolios.  I can bring you one at a time.”

“Do so, if you please,” said the enthusiast.  “I should like to examine them all, even if it takes a week.”

The obliging youth inclined his head and departed.

There is a delightful air of leisure and learning about the Print Room, and an entire absence of hustle.  Two students besides himself were the only other members of the public, one studying Holbein, the other Blake.

[Illustration:  PORTRAIT OF AN OLD LADY, FULL FACE, HER HANDS FOLDED

1641.  The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.]