a most interesting period of growing art; young, aspiring, hopeful; imperfect, but failing nobly, being full of faith and reverence; art not yet moulded to conventional forms, leaving full play to the imagination. I cannot show you the progress of this work, as it is unfinished, and a worker's power is paralyzed by the work being judged while incomplete. So much power is lost in imparting it to another; virtue is, at it were, gone out of it."

"The moist wings will not bear being breathed upon, the fledgling handled, the flower-bud pulled open," said I; "though I like seeing the infancy of an idea.” "Do you like our taste in window draperies; or do you think that, like the chapter on snakes in Ireland, there are none?"

I looked up. I had not noticed the absence of curtains, but now I saw a graceful arrangement of scarves, in alternate colours of pink and purple, wreathed across the windows from the top corners of the architraves, as we see them introduced in Pompeian paintings.

The pink scarves had a Grecian wave-border worked in purple, and the purple ones a border in pink the pink was of a tint peculiarly happy, casting a rosy glow upward on the cornice; the drawing-room was otherwise a symphony in white. I said this.

"These symphonies are mostly monotones," said she. "But I was pleased to hit upon this idea for the

windows, because it has the neo-Greek character; and, above all, since the room is a music-room, one would not obstruct sound. In this room I aim at a soft silvery lustre, rather than the tone of old gold affected by modern fashion. I wish the upholstery to have the effect of pure white linen, outlineembroidered in positive colour."

"Toned white, in all shades of cream, ivory, ecru, dirt, and coffee-stain, has been run to death," said I, looking round me with real enjoyment. "It is refreshing to see in London the pure whiteness of marble, silver, and snow."

"Lilies, lace, milk, and swan's wings," she interrupted, laughing; "and to have it all washable as a child's white frock. I trimmed this soft white Siamese silk, as dust-covers to my chairs, with pieces of all kinds of lace I had by me; it makes an interesting exhibition, and it will wash. I do not care for starched muslin or lace curtains. It seems so senseless to block out the upper light of a room, the best artistic effect of any. As for striped windowblinds, they are absolutely painful.”

Plants climbing on wire netting make the pleasantest window-screen one can have," said I, seeing that Mrs. Gay's French croisées opened on a long balcony filled with plants. The railings were wreathed with Virginia creeper, while on wire netting spread over some of the window-frames, grew

maurandya, clematis, and others of the finer kinds of climbers.

The harp and grand-piano remained of their former furniture, with Mr. Gay's violoncello, and a concertina belonging to one of the boys; and Mrs. Gay had had a clever music-stand made in birch by a carpenter, which Blanchflor painted in water-colour in a Pompeian style, before varnishing it; and worked, in bright colours, a long white linen curtain, to keep the dust from the music-books, which were laid in horizontal shelves below, and in vertical divisions above. It ran on castors, set in short, turned legs; a movable music-desk with bronze candle-sconces formed the lid.

"Did you notice my arrangement of the diningroom windows?"

I had done so. The windows were set in a bay; and instead of having a curtain-pole across, or bent to fit the bay, two strong bronze bracket poles swung from the piers on each side of the central window, from whence hung two long pennon-shaped silken banners, of different colours and devices, bordered with dark-blue fringe. The effect was unique, and entirely useful for shade and ornament. The sun could be shaded out at whatever angle you pleased. The lower points of the pennons reached a little below the opening of the window, or about the height of a table from the floor.

The girls came home, beaming, from the flowershow.

"I must show you Blanchflor's ceiling," said Anima, eagerly. "Come and look at it."

She threw open the door of the room her sister was painting, and so let the cat out of the bag. The ceiling was painted all over in arabesques, and small pictures of cherubs playing musical instruments, in tender pearly colouring and Raffaellesque style.

"She did it all herself, and in less than a month. The idea is from a private room in the Vatican, but the designs are many of them her own."

I tried not to see any more, and was glad the walls were much hidden by a screen, the steps, and cloths; but the ceiling was finished, and I could not help seeing it was delightful.

"The idea is a frieze of the History of Music" But I would hear no more-I was not to see it unfinished.

"Those were my salad days, when I was green in judgment." -ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.

ELINDA BRASSY felt herself tasteful

and experienced in shopping beyond others. With her it was ever, "What

do we want to get?" instead of "What

can we do without?" so that nothing but the poverty of a small country town barred her own imperceptible reduction to equal poverty.

Now established in London, with a newly acquired and unexpected fortune, she revelled freely in advanced taste, of which her variegated brick house at South Hampstead was the outcome.

South Kensington, with its clusters of carbuncle houses, is almost out-artisted by its younger rival, South Hampstead. Both were once rich in picturesque