The Sunday morning news. [volume] (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1886-1891, 1886-10-17
A PICTURE TO ORDER.

scene, dingy. old, tumbledown build
iugi better-days quarter Of New York.
Across the front of this smoke-be-
grimed pile is embszoped a legend which,
of recent origin, must have been put
here in sport. In runs: Enterprise
Building"
The pawDbroker,' the tallow-candler,
aud the old-clotbes- man are in possession
of the ground floor, while the signs adorn-
ing the stairwa y-j ambs Tell to what met
ley crew the upper regions have been
abandoned.
Within this portal, almost blockading
it with his broad shoulders, stands man
of type more numerous in the fiftes than
now. A genuine Forty niner red
shirt, corduroys, top boots, leather belt,
broad hat, sunburnt face.
His great, rough hand is fumbling ire
solutely through his big, tangled beard,
as he regards intentlv a sign upon the
stairs which reads: Portraits and Land
scapes Painted. Room 80.
He has plainly been successful in his
gold-seeking. Even his back shows that.
1t is broad, well-to-do, one-hundred-
cents-on-the dollar back. Perhaps he has
had enough of 'roughing 1t, and longs
for taste of the refined delights denied
him IN his exile.
Whatever his intention, be seems half
ashamed of it; lie takes a hurried glance
up and down the street, and hesltales
again before his resolve is taken, and bis
heavy boots go lun bering up the stairs.
In little room on the top floor sits a
shabby man, the physical opposite OF the
Rrst.
The well worn books upon the shelves
and the bullying portfolios of "studies"
all about show that he too has been a dig
ger after treasure, but of another kind,
and his face gives evidence that he has
found it.
His wide, shadowy eyes see more than
they rest upon, and his high brow teens
with fancies far above the groyeliDg horde
about him.
Upon the canvas before him his hand
combines the fruits of research, observa-
ton and reflection in results TOO good TO
win the general applause-too perfect 10
be widely understood.
His labors have not brought him the ro-
bust health, nor yet the material rewards
of the other.
He is thin and weak and miserably
poor. Strive as he may with his unbusi-
nesslke. impractical nature, he can but
keep himself half fed.
The day is bitter cold, and he pauses
often in his work to beat together his blue
fingers, almost as numb and lifeless as the
little, rusty, unused stove in the corner.
How unequally the goods Of this world
are divided
What a pity such as this cannot ex-
change of their possessions to the pont of
equalization with that other class repre-
scented by the wearer of the heavy boots
now numbering up toward him.
What a pity--ah, yes, but Fate doesn't
often lend an ear to Pity.
Perhaps he was Illuminating somewhat
to this effect when the clump dumping of
the tep boots, followed by vigorous
hombardmeut of his door, interrupted
him.
He rises and opens the door, starting
half in lear half with pleasure at the stall
wait figure before him.
With snch model he could paint men.
"G'd mornin', stranger" says The
t.Forty-piber.'
Good morning." come in" the other
replies, holding the door Hospitality open.
''C'n leok at the pictures?"
Certainly"
The visitor steps over the threshold,
and by the time the artist has closed the
door and seated himself ut his work, he
has gone around the room, has looked"
at them, and plainly failed to find some
thing he as plainly hoped to see.
He stands now aud watches the artist
laying the colors on the canvas.
'.Ah," he says, II don't care much for
pictures. They cont look like cut doors
They don't look like the place want to
see. Say. stranger could y paint pic
tur' j'st as I'd describe il t'ye, SO it'd look
like tn very place?"
II am aflaid not. Words are not easily
translated into form and color. The usual
terms of description are too indefinite,
capable of too many and too varied inter
pretations: too liable to distortion through
the transforming influences of the paint
er's own imagination TO render success
probable.
mo, no; don't mean anything like
thai. jus make it the way iii tell ye.
Kinder pan around, aad I'll help VT
strike it. Try it, strangerl iii stand the
damages. N if ye make t look like the
place, iii pay ye well f'r it,
The inducements are irresistible to the
hungry Bohemian, so he puts fresh can
vas on the easel and sea,s himself, palette
In hand, 10 make the attempt.
The other shuts his eyes moment in
retrospection, and then says: well,
there's river runnin' right through the
middle of this pictur' that want t. see
Not a big river, j'st kind Of an over.
grown creek. Big enough f'r trout an
suntish that d do a boys eyes good to
look at. But that amt much of de-
scription, is It?And he scratches his head
in puzzled way, and tries again: "Wel'
this river is about forty foot wide on the
average. J'st paint it about that wide
right across tue middle there, will We?
Kinder windin' around, like this
But the other doesn't pantit. Instead,
he saws: There is nothing tangible in