made that a rule.

[11] Michael Barabás, a famous Hungarian painter, born at Markosfalu in 1810.

[11]

My resolution produced an imposing effect on the company. It's a very nice thing when a man can do something which nobody else can! They had to[Pg 18] agree that Bessy and I should sit alone in a little side room, which had only one window, and the lower part of even this window had to be covered by a Spanish screen so as to get a proper light. And nobody was to disturb us so long as the sitting lasted.

[Pg 18]

The first sitting did not last long. In oil painting, the image should first of all be painted under, that is to say, with dull neutral colours. In those days I had never heard of such a thing as a first coating; while it is in this stage the picture is not fit to be looked at. It is absolutely hideous, and the better the likeness, the worse it looks. I allowed nobody to look at it, not even Bessy. I locked up the first essay in my painter's knapsack; it was a miniature. At this stage it was quite sufficient if the insetting had succeeded, with the figure in profile, but the countenance quite en face; the shadows piled up, but the background merely thrown out tentatively, and the fundamental colours of the dress just insinuated. Every one will see that this last part is the hardest of all.

The company was very much deceived in its expectations when it was informed that I had nothing to show it. Every one had expected that in an hour and a half I should have finished the eye or the mouth at any rate; they now thought to themselves that nothing at all would come of it.

"Well, but will Bessy look pretty in this dress?" asked her mother.

[Pg 19]What could I do at such a question as this but look silly? As if I knew whether Bessy had had a pretty dress on or not! All I knew was that I had had to use for it a little "English lake," some "Neapolitan yellow," "Venetian white," and just a scrinch of "burnt ochre."

[Pg 19]

"I can tell you that it was a very tiresome amusement," said Bessy. "The face a little more that way—Not so serious—Not so smiling—Don't sit so stiffly—Raise your finger—Don't move about so much.—And you've laid so much licorice-juice on my portrait that they'll fancy I'm a gipsy girl."

I hastened to assure her 

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