Another artist, presumably in a similar condition of benignity, arriving home very late, softly unlocks the street door, goes up stairs, very softly enters his bedroom, and undresses--very softly, so as not to disturb his wife, and finally creeps into bed--likewise very softly and gently; to be startled by his better half asking him--very softly and gently, no doubt--if he is aware that he has got into bed with his top-hat on! One member always raises a hearty laugh by his imitation of a brother member--a man of the greatest good humour, but of third-rate ability--who, debating with another artist on the great Whistler question, thus sums the matter up: "If Whistler is right, then you, and me, and Michael Angelo are all wrong." Sometimes in this way one may pick up some interesting anecdotes of the men of a past generation. Holland, the famous landscape painter, who was once a member, used to have many anecdotes about Turner. On one occasion he was sitting near to him at dinner, when a lady observed to him that she admired his pictures very much, although she could not say that she understood them. "Don't you wish you had the brains to do so?" replied Turner--a little rudely, it must be confessed. [Illustration: THE LIFE CLASS. _Drawn by W. Douglas Almond._] Members take it in turns to "set" the models, who generally pose for an hour, then take a short rest, and afterwards sit for another hour. They are placed on a raised platform under a top light, the artists being ranged in a semicircle facing them. No one is allowed to speak to the model except the member whose duty it is to set him or her, and the utmost silence is enjoined. Some of the models take great interest in the work of the artists, and like to see what they have made them look like. Many curious characters are found amongst them, and the stories of their humours and oddities are endless and infinitely diverting. Not the least amusing is that of the man who had posed for apostles and saints so long that he could not be induced to sit for a common coster. "It would be such a come-down, sir," he said, with a rueful countenance. There is also a story--possibly apocryphal--of a model who had got beyond sitting deploring his changed estate, in that he who had sat for "lords and cardinals" was reduced to "wet-nursing a kangaroo" (having obtained employment at the Zoo).