The house was furnished with great taste; everything spoke of that comfort which the English value before luxury. A thousand and one little details told of an artistic woman's hand reigning supreme in the little domain, and one left the house feeling, "these people are happy and evidently well-off; there may be artists who vegetate, but Philip Grantham is not one of them." The garden was admirably kept, the lawn smooth and soft as a Turkey carpet to the foot; and when the sun filtered through the trees to the grass, you could imagine yourself in the depths of the country, instead of near the centre of a great city. The studio was a favourite room of the Granthams. Loving care had been expended upon it, and the result was a worker's paradise that invited to lofty labours and cosy conversation. Dora Grantham was her husband's comrade in art, and all the leisure that was hers, after seeing well to her household, was spent at Philip's side. The studio was more than comfortable--it was even luxurious, with its beautiful Renaissance mantelpiece of carved oak, its rich oriental rugs and curtains and hanging eastern lamps. All these gave an atmosphere of restful, dreamy ease to the place; and the fresh flowers that in all seasons filled the rare porcelain vases struck a note of gaiety among the sombreness of the old oak furniture. A thousand curios from all the ends of the earth had been accumulated in this beloved apartment, and here, too, stood Dora's Pleyel piano and Philip's bookcase of precious volumes on art, all richly bound. A huge screen, gay with eastern embroideries, hid the door that opened into the road; and in this veritable nest, nothing reminded of a hustling and bustling world outside. In summer, through the open door that led into the garden, one got a delicious vista of green foliage and turf. In the centre of the studio stood two easels of almost equal size, and when I have told you that at these two easels, placed side by side, quite near each other, worked Philip and Dora, you will rightly understand that this studio had not been so fitted up to serve as a mere workshop, but that all its details had been suggested by the love of two kindred artistic spirits, who adored each other and passed most of their time there in loving rivalry and mutual encouragement.