--'You must yourself be an artist. I can see it from your observations.' --'Yes, she is an artist, although an amateur,' interposed Lady Modestina. --'No, don't say that,' interrupted the marchioness. --'I dare say you paint much,' said I. --'No, not at all,' replied the marchioness, and continued as she laughed slightly, 'except, perhaps, that I used to paint occasionally my own portrait, of course after the style of the _chef-d'œuvre_ of your "literary picture" in the faintest and lightest colours. By the way, I also like Japanese methods of gardening. I once had a Japanese gardener for three years at my country seat.' --'Really,' said I, 'you interest me very much.' --'He was very clever; far more so than any European, any Frenchman, in the same calling of life could ever possibly be.' --'With us,' said I, 'it is very common. Every gardener understands the ordinary art of "garden-making," though, of course, there are only a few real experts. But let me tell you that it comes more from the general atmosphere and surroundings in which they grow up. There is nothing surprising in it to our eyes.' --'May be. But to us it seems extraordinary. After three years, during which he served me very faithfully, I transferred him to a Frenchman, Mr. Canny by name.' --'Is that so? I have seen his Japanese gardens.' --'Then you know him?' --'Yes, I first came to know him when he visited my country some years ago. The other day I made a great circuit round Paris in his motor: we left Paris by the Bois, then St. Cloud, Versailles, on to Fontainebleau, making a large circuit through Cagny, Surveilliers, Beaumont, Pointoise, thus reaching St. Germain, thence on to St Cloud and back to Paris by the same route. We must have travelled three or four hundred kilometres.' --'Then you must have passed through the forests of Fontainebleau. Are not the trees and rocks there splendid?' --'Yes, that is just what struck me very much, but I am most interested to hear that you appreciate the value of natural rocks. They are very important elements in our Japanese gardens.' --'I cannot understand how so great a number of rocks could have been heaped up there in that peculiar way. Some people imagine that at one time they formed the bottom of the sea.' --'Oh! but if so, it must have been a very long time ago. At all events, before we came into existence,' said I, laughing, and added, 'I should like to get a concession from the government to take those rocks, because the time will certainly come when they will be wanted for French gardens, and perhaps I could then become a millionaire.'