us) so stupid, liked to live in a little esoteric world and celebrate his mysteries with due solemnity, to look out with contempt upon the average Philistine (though the phrase was not yet popularised), and receive the homage of appreciative Americans and the mild lady-authors who still thought literary ambition a rather audacious breach of the proprieties. There is mention in one place of an English nobleman who ventured to study art at Rome in a blouse and a 'flapped hat.' We, the devotees of art, are to see how superior he was to his fellows who were playing at the feudal baron on their estates, or perhaps even superintending a dog-fight in St. Giles'. There is 'something fascinating,' says Miss Barrett, in that 'Bohemian way of living,' and we are invited to wish well to this gallant defiance of British prejudice. There can be no doubt that painting is a more creditable occupation than dog-fighting, though it seems a little unfair to suggest such an unpleasant amusement as the typical alternative. Still, a man may attend a studio in a blouse without being a superior being, and I somehow feel as if that little literary and artistic world of 1845 had standards of excellence before which I cannot bow the knee unreservedly. Perhaps it is partly
