He began on the head, thinking that he would work slowly downwards, but, he could not understand why, he found it infinitely more difficult to draw a head from the model than to draw one from his imagination.  He got into difficulties.  He glanced at Miss Price.  She was working with vehement gravity.  Her brow was wrinkled with eagerness, and there was an anxious look in her eyes.  It was hot in the studio, and drops of sweat stood on her forehead.  She was a girl of twenty-six, with a great deal of dull gold hair; it was handsome hair, but it was carelessly done, dragged back from her forehead and tied in a hurried knot.  She had a large face, with broad, flat features and small eyes; her skin was pasty, with a singular unhealthiness of tone, and there was no colour in the cheeks.  She had an unwashed air and you could not help wondering if she slept in her clothes.  She was serious and silent.  When the next pause came, she stepped back to look at her work.

“I don’t know why I’m having so much bother,” she said.  “But I mean to get it right.”  She turned to Philip.  “How are you getting on?”

“Not at all,” he answered, with a rueful smile.

She looked at what he had done.

“You can’t expect to do anything that way.  You must take measurements.  And you must square out your paper.”

She showed him rapidly how to set about the business.  Philip was impressed by her earnestness, but repelled by her want of charm.  He was grateful for the hints she gave him and set to work again.  Meanwhile other people had come in, mostly men, for the women always arrived first, and the studio for the time of year (it was early yet) was fairly full.  Presently there came in a young man with thin, black hair, an enormous nose, and a face so long that it reminded you of a horse.  He sat down next to Philip and nodded across him to Miss Price.

“You’re very late,” she said.  “Are you only just up?”

“It was such a splendid day, I thought I’d lie in bed and think how beautiful it was out.”

Philip smiled, but Miss Price took the remark seriously.

“That seems a funny thing to do, I should have thought it would be more to the point to get up and enjoy it.”

“The way of the humorist is very hard,” said the young man gravely.

He did not seem inclined to work.  He looked at his canvas; he was working in colour, and had sketched in the day before the model who was posing.  He turned to Philip.

“Have you just come out from England?”

“Yes.”

“How did you find your way to Amitrano’s?”

“It was the only school I knew of.”

“I hope you haven’t come with the idea that you will learn anything here which will be of the smallest use to you.”

“It’s the best school in Paris,” said Miss Price.  “It’s the only one where they take art seriously.”

“Should art be taken seriously?” the young man asked; and since Miss Price replied only with a scornful shrug, he added:  “But the point is, all schools are bad.  They are academical, obviously.  Why this is less injurious than most is that the teaching is more incompetent than elsewhere.  Because you learn nothing....”