This “light,” as the panel is technically called, was in a very bad state of repair, and as one of my assistants passed through my studio on his way home, for he had finished his day’s work, he remarked that a very little shaking would cause the old monk to fall from the leadwork and demolish himself. To which I replied by asking him to make it his first care in the morning to relead the figure, and thus render it secure for a few more generations, as such fine figures were not very frequently seen. At eight o’clock I was left alone in the studio, as I had determined to work on till midnight, and get my painting well forward for “firing” (burning in the vitreous colours). Somehow I can always do a vast deal more work when alone than when others are present, however quiet they may be in their movements. There is in solitude nothing to distract the attention, and one rapidly becomes absorbed in one’s work, which is more expeditiously and accurately executed. Ten o’clock came, and I prepared myself a cup of _café au lait_, and smoked a cigarette. I cannot smoke and work at the same time, as many artists have the knack of doing--for either my attention is more on my cigarette than on my work (which is a loss of time), or I become so engrossed with my painting that the paper cylinder is forgotten, and goes out, necessitating frequent and irritating relightings. As I puffed my little white tube of Dubec, I could not help taking another look at the monk in all his glossy rigidity, and the thought came into my head that being an ecclesiastic of the fifteenth century, it was just possible that the monk so carefully delineated was a portrait of the painter of the whole window! Why not? Who could tell? There he hung, upon a glass screen, behind which was a gas-jet, giving sufficient light for me to be able to discern every detail of the drawing and painting of the figure. This was more apparent because the studio in which I stood was in darkness, except for the brilliant light _behind_ the easel upon which I was working.