"Who is that poor woman who has so mistaken her vocation?" she asked with compassionate gesture toward the coiffure _a la Chinoise_. "That? Oh, that's the celebrated Swedish artist, Miss Thingumbobbia, of whom you have heard, of course. She returns to Stockholm next week to paint the king's portrait. Mon Dieu! but I would give all my hair for the genius of her little finger!" answered pretty Mademoiselle Hubert, scraping her palette viciously, as if it were responsible for her artistic inferiority to the gifted Thingumbobbia. "O-o-o-h!" gasped Paletta. "But who is the sweet creature with golden hair, who looks infused with fair ideals to her very finger-tips?" [Illustration: AN AMIABLE MADONNA!] "She? Oh, she's Miss Araminta Shoddy from Michigan Avenue, Chicago, who is finishing her education in Paris. She comes here twice a week for drawing-lessons from the antique, and also in pursuit of general information, I should think, judging from her questions. Only yesterday she said, 'Ladies, who can tell me the costume of the Venus de Melos? I have an idea that it would be stunning for my next fancy-dress ball!'" "Ladies," cried Miss San Francisco, invisible among the easels, "has Professor Manley given out the subject of our composition for next week?" "Yes," answered a dozen voices--"'The Flight into Egypt.'" "Oh, Miss Shoddy, Miss Shoddy, _will_ you pose for my Virgin Mother?" cried another dozen. [Illustration: THE MORNING LESSON.] [Illustration: "HE'S GONE, GIRLS!"] "Oh, Mees Shoddy, if you will pose for my Madonna I will pose for yours," echoed the Raphaelesque Thingumbobbia. Just before noon the forest of easels swayed slightly beneath a breeze of excitement. A masculine step was heard at the door. The model's expression became if not divine, at least superhuman. The ladies ceased their chatter, and plied their brushes and crayons with increased diligence. The morning professor entered, and passed from easel to easel, commending this, criticising that, rebuking something else, making a few touches of the brush upon several canvases, crossing others with a network of charcoal-lines to prove inaccuracy of drawing, distributed _tres biens_ and _pas mals_ judiciously, and then with a pleasant "Bon jour, mesdames," passed away, leaving behind him about an equal measure of delight and dismay. [Illustration: "H-E-A-VENLY CHEESE FOR A FRANC A POUND?"] "I hope his bed-clothes will always come up at the foot!" growled Austina, whose canvas looked like a map of a humming-bird's flight done in charcoal. "Let's all subscribe and buy The Angel a bouquet for Christmas," gushed enthusiastically the British blonde Godsalina, upon whom one of the _pas mals_ had fallen, and who had the true faith of her nation in the efficacy of "tips" for sovereign or beggar. [Illustration: "JE SUIS A VOUS."]