The torture those sittings were to me, I hope he never knew. He was so good and kind, and did so much to make them bearable, whiling away the time by talking to us and telling us amusing stories, or getting someone else to read an entertaining book aloud to us while he painted. But it was all no good. Outside I could see the sun shining, and hear the birds singing and the wind whistling through the trees, and I--who longed to be out there in the sunshine, singing with the birds, and running races with the wind,--I must be cooped up within four walls, in a room that instead of the fragrance of the flowers, smelt of nasty oil-colours! It was not to be borne. As well try to imprison the wild west wind, or stop the dancing mountain-stream in its course! I was just as wild and free, and my mother sometimes asked if any power on earth could be found to tame me. Had she but known! All too soon a spell would be worked, transforming the wayward child into a quiet gentle maiden, grave-eyed and serious. It was by the discipline of sorrow that the change should be wrought--in the sick-room that the lesson must be learnt; there I could sit for hours, silent and motionless, dreading lest a movement, a whisper should disturb the dear sufferer beside whose pillow I watched. But already then, in my wildest, most reckless mood, and however my spirit might chafe at the enforced immobility of the lengthy sittings, I felt the soothing influence of the artist’s gentle voice, and the deep full tones could lull my feverish impatience. Nor did the impression wear off as time went on; echoes of that sympathetic voice live in my memory, calling up many a bygone scene--long talks as we rambled through the forest, dreams and aspirations, hopes and fears, all the joys and sorrows of those vanished days,--Sohn’s memory is inseparably associated with all of these. The portraits he painted extend over a long series of years. One of Otto was done just before the poor boy’s death--my father’s also, at a time when we knew that he had not long to live among us--my mother he depicted at all times and seasons, and under all possible circumstances, from ecstasy to the deepest mourning. He used to say, that he hoped to live long enough to make one more portrait of her with snow-white hair. But this wish remained unfulfilled, for my mother’s hair had not yet turned grey, when he was called away from us.