respectable watering-place, Tidbury-on-the-Marsh, was an order for a life-size oil portrait of a great local celebrity—one Mr. Boxsious, a solicitor, who was understood to do the most thriving business of any lawyer in the town.
The portrait was intended as a testimonial “expressive (to use the language of the circular forwarded to me at the time) of the eminent services of Mr. Boxsious in promoting and securing the prosperity of the town.” It had been subscribed for by the “Municipal Authorities and Resident Inhabitants” of Tidbury-on-the-Marsh; and it was to be presented, when done, to Mrs. Boxsious, “as a slight but sincere token”—and so forth. A timely recommendation from one of my kindest friends and patrons placed the commission for painting the likeness in my lucky hands; and I was instructed to attend on a certain day at Mr. Boxsious’s private residence, with all my materials ready for taking a first sitting.
On arriving at the house, I was shown into a very prettily furnished morning-room. The bow-window looked out on a large inclosed meadow, which represented the principal square in Tidbury. On the opposite side of the meadow I could see the new hotel (with a wing lately added), and close by, the old hotel obstinately unchanged since it had first been built. Then, further down the street, the doctor’s house, with a colored lamp and a small door-plate, and the banker’s office, with a plain lamp and a big door-plate—then some dreary private lodging-houses—then, at right angles to these, a street of shops; the cheese-monger’s very small, the chemist’s very smart, the pastry-cook’s very dowdy, and the green-grocer’s very dark, I was still looking out at the view thus presented, when I was suddenly apostrophized by a glib, disputatious voice behind me.
“Now, then, Mr. Artist,” cried the voice, “do you call that getting ready for work? Where are your paints and brushes, and all the rest of it? My name’s Boxsious, and I’m here to sit for my picture.”
I turned round, and confronted a little man with his legs astraddle, and his hands in his pockets. He had light-gray eyes, red all round the lids, bristling pepper-colored hair, an unnaturally rosy complexion, and an eager, impudent, clever look. I made two discoveries in one glance at him: First, that he was a wretched subject for a portrait; secondly, that, whatever he might do or say,
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