I got prizes for
it at school. My poor mother was very proud of my gift,
and she gave me a box of water-colours as a present. She showed
my sketches to the pastor and the doctor and the judge.
And they sent me to Amsterdam to try for a scholarship, and I won
it. Poor soul, she was so proud; and though it nearly broke
her heart to part from me, she smiled, and would not show me
her grief. She was pleased that her son should be an artist.
They pinched and saved so that I should have enough to live on,
and when my first picture was exhibited they came to
Amsterdam to see it, my father and mother and my sister,
and my mother cried when she looked at it." His kind eyes glistened.
"And now on every wall of the old house there is one of my
pictures in a beautiful gold frame."
He glowed with happy pride. I thought of those cold scenes of
his, with their picturesque peasants and cypresses and olive-trees.
They must look queer in their garish frames on the walls of
the peasant house.
"The dear soul thought she was doing a wonderful thing for me
when she made me an artist, but perhaps, after all, it would
have been better for me if my father's will had prevailed and
I were now but an honest carpenter.
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