conviction.

"And where is he studying?"

[11]

[11]

"He has never studied anything but mining engineering. He is working with his father here."

The unconscious sadness of the speaker's tone impressed her listener.

"He does landscapes, too," went on the mother, lifting one after another of the sketches of mountain, valley, and streamlet, "a little of everything, you see." Mrs. Sidney regarded the work wistfully.

"Why, they're lovely," declared Mrs. Fabian. "Why don't you pin them up on the walls?"

"Because it rather annoys Phil's father, to see them, and it only tantalizes the boy."

"So Mr. Sidney isn't willing he should study?"

"I don't think he would thwart us if he saw any hope in it, but one can't enter on the life of an art-student without any capital. Allan knows there is a living for Phil in the work of a mining engineer, so he has discouraged the boy's talent."

"It is a great responsibility to thwart a child's bent," declared Mrs. Fabian impressively.

"I have always felt so. I used to be very rest[12]less and anxious about it. My husband seemed to feel that because Phil was a strapping boy, a natural athlete, that painting was a womanish profession for him. He had the ability to help him into mining engineering lines, and he always pooh-poohed the idea of Phil's attempting to be an artist." Mrs. Sidney gave a little shrug. "We didn't have the money anyway, so Allan naturally has had his way."

[12]

"One can't blame him," returned Mrs. Fabian, who had relaxed as the wind ceased to shake the cabin. "Painting is even more precarious than acting; yet what a talent the boy has!"

She held before her a bold sketch in charcoal of the mountain-side in the winter—few in strokes, but striking in its breadth and power.

"He 

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