This was at the Royal Academy. The rooms were crowded with the usual mob, for it was early in June. There were the country ladies--rosy, fat, and jolly--catalogue and pencil in hand, dragging after them husbands, brothers, sons--ruddy, stalwart fellows--who wearily followed from room to room,--ignorant of art, and yet unwilling to be thought ignorant,--flocking to any picture which seemed to contain a story or a subject likely to interest them, such as a horse, or a race, or a match of some kind, and turning away with a half-conscious feeling that they ought to rejoice in not liking the much-praised picture, instead of being ashamed of it, so unlike a horse did they find it, so unfaithful a representation of figure or of action. There were artistic ladies with their new fashion of dress and pale languid airs, listlessly exchanging the commonplace of the fashionable school; there were professional ladies, lawyers, and doctors, 'doing' all the rooms between two consultations in an hour; there were schoolgirls from Harrow, yawning over the Exhibition, which it was a duty they owed to themselves to see early in the season, unless they could get tickets, which they all ardently desired, for the fortnight's private view; there were shoals of men in little parties of two and four, escorted by some good-natured uncle or elderly cousin. The crowd squeezed round the fashionable pictures; they passed heedlessly before pictures of which nobody talked; they all tried to look critical; those who pretended to culture searched after strange adjectives; those who did not, said everything was pretty, and yawned furtively; the ladies whispered remarks to each other, with a quick nod of intelligence; and they received the feeble criticism of the men with the deferent smile due to politeness, or a half-concealed contempt. This year there were more than the usual number of pictures--in fact, the whole of the five-and-twenty rooms were crowded. Fortunately, they were mostly small rooms, and it was remarkable that the same subjects occurred over and over again. 'The same story,' said the Professor, 'every year. No invention; we follow like sheep. Here is Judith slaying Holofernes'--they were then in the Ancient History Department--'here is Jael slaying Sisera; here are Miriam and Deborah singing their songs of triumph; here is Joan of Arc raising the siege of Orleans,--all exactly the same as when I was a girl forty years ago and more. Ancient History, indeed! What do they know about Ancient History?' 'Why do you not teach them, then, Professor?' asked Lord Chester. 'I will tell you why, my lord, in a few weeks,--perhaps.'