Angela had heard from Eugene that the National Academy of Design was a forum for the display of art to which the public was invited or admitted for a charge. To have a picture accepted by this society and hung on the line was in its way a mark of merit and approval, though Eugene did not think very highly of it. All the pictures were judged by a jury of artists which decided whether they should be admitted or rejected, and if admitted whether they should be given a place of honor or hung in some inconspicuous position. To be hung "on the line" was to have your picture placed in the lower tier where the light was excellent and the public could get a good view of it. Eugene had thought the first two years he was in New York that he was really not sufficiently experienced or meritorious, and the previous year he had thought that he would hoard all that he was doing for his first appearance in some exhibition of his own, thinking the National Academy commonplace and retrogressive. The exhibitions he had seen thus far had been full of commonplace, dead-and-alive stuff, he thought. It was no great honor to be admitted to such a collection. Now, because MacHugh was trying, and because he had accumulated nearly enough pictures for exhibition at a private gallery which he hoped to interest, he was anxious to see what the standard body of American artists thought of his work. They might reject him. If so that would merely prove that they did not recognize a radical departure from accepted methods and subject matter as art. The impressionists, he understood, were being so ignored. Later they would accept him. If he were admitted it would simply mean that they knew better than he believed they did. "I believe I will do it," he said; "I'd like to know what they think of my stuff anyhow." The picture was sent as he had planned, and to his immense satisfaction it was accepted and hung. It did not, for some reason, attract as much attention as it might, but it was not without its modicum of praise. Owen Overman, the poet, met him in the general reception entrance of the Academy on the opening night, and congratulated him sincerely. "I remember seeing that in _Truth_," he said, "but it's much better in the original. It's fine. You ought to do a lot of those things." "I am," replied Eugene. "I expect to have a show of my own one of these days." He called Angela, who had wandered away to look at a piece of statuary, and introduced her. "I was just telling your husband how much I like his picture," Overman informed her.