“Now lie quietly, Alice, for a moment,” said Martin. He had placed her on the ancient lounge, the only reasonable piece of furniture in the room. “Now close your eyes—ah! not _so_ close, let them be half open, as though you were just waking up—now I will paint a picture the world shall wonder at! Yes, I also will make a Sunrise!” Quietly and motionless, as though bereft of life, the child lay and watched the artist’s movements; in him she forgot herself, consequently had none of that intense consciousness of expression so often perceivable in the portraits of people who become immortalized, and perpetuated on—canvas! What a sight to see! the lonely desolate places where the impoverished children of Genius, the painters, sculptors, and poets, have with patient but almost hopeless toil wrought out their wonder-works! Oh! eyes whose range of vision was circumscribed by four contracted walls, have looked on scenes of rarer and richer beauty than travelers in many climes have seen; and voices, husky, tuneless with want and grief, have breathed, even when tortured with the death-agony, songs, that the world has hushed its mighty voice, and its tumultuous heart to hear; warriors have conquered on battle-fields, whose inspiration was the song that burst from the dying son of poverty, while pain and fever prostrated him, who kept back by force of mind the advance of death, until the strain of glory should be fully and perfectly conceived! An hour passed, and not for one moment had the hand of the artist paused—it is enough to say that even he was satisfied with the progress he had made in those swift-winged sixty minutes. Upon the easy couch Alice had fallen asleep, unperceived by the young painter—he awakened her with some regret, but the time he had promised to keep her with him was passed, and Martin had little inclination to brave the wrath of the mother’s tongue. Thoughtfully he led the child to her home, and when he parted with her there, it was with a heart full of sorrow, for he knew that a life of hardship, and want, and temptation, was in store for the beautiful girl.