But the popularity obtained by Jan’s pigs soon surpassed that of all his other performances. “Make pigs for I, Janny Lake!” and “Make pigs for I, too!” was a sort of whispering chorus that went on perpetually under the Dame’s nose. But when she found that it led to no disturbance, that the children only huddled round the child Jan and his slate like eager scholars round a teacher, Dame Datchett was wise enough to be thankful that Jan possessed a power she had never been able to acquire,—that he could “keep the young varments quiet.” “He be most’s good’s a monitor,” thought the Dame; and she took a nap, and Jan’s genius held the school together. The children tried other influences besides persuasion. “Jan Lake, I’ve brought thee an apple. Draa out a pig for I on a’s slate.” Jan had a spirit of the most upright and honorable kind. He never took an unfair advantage, and to the petty cunning which was “Willum’s” only idea of wisdom he seemed by nature incapable of stooping. But in addition to, and alongside of, his artistic temperament, there appeared to be in him no small share of the spirit of a trader. The capricious, artistic spirit made him fitful in his use even of the beloved slate; but, when he was least inclined to draw, the offer of something he very much wanted would spur him to work; and in the spirit of a true trader, he worked well. He would himself have made a charming study for a painter, as he sat surrounded by his patrons, who watched him with gaping mouths of wonderment, as his black eyes moved rapidly to and fro between the river’s brink and his slate, and his tiny fingers steered the pencil into cunning lines which “made pigs.” “The very moral!” as William declared, smacking his corduroy breeches with delight. Sometimes Jan hardly knew that they were there, he was so absorbed in his work. His eyes glowed with that strong pleasure which comes in the very learning of any art, perhaps of any craft. Now and then, indeed, his face would cloud with a different expression, and in fits of annoyance, like that in which his foster-mother found him outside the windmill, he would break his pencils, and ruthlessly destroy sketches with which his patrons would have been quite satisfied. But at other moments his face would twinkle with a very sunshine of smiles, as he was conscious of having caught exactly the curve which expressed obstinacy in this pig’s back, or the air of reckless defiance in that other’s tail. And so he learned little or nothing, and improved in his drawing, and kept the school quiet, and had always a pocket well filled with sweet things, nails, string, tops, balls, and such treasures, earned by his art.