The Arkansaw traveler., 1888-04-21
4 Spoiled Negative.


 painter, nor sculptor, nor a musi- clan, nor, indeed, devotee at the shrine of any fine art-yet an artist. He could draw no more than a baby :; his genius was anything but histri- onic he was not even a man of letters but he was an artist. On the other hand, he was no house. painter nor de- signer of ornamental friezes. Indeed, in his own opinion and in that of a few enthusiasts as bigoted as himself, Dicks art paS fine art, and he wrote his Art with a capital-a length to which your most eminent decorator scarcely goes. Though confessedly an amateur at his craft, Dick was as con- scientiously painstaking as the most earnest minded professional, besides being the technical equal and the artistic superior of most professionals. When at work he was an artist first and man afterwards: he was only once known to allow human infirmity to interfere with the mechanism of his art. But since that one recorded slip made an episode in his life, take 1t that the events connected there with are the legitimate and indisputa- ble property of the faithful historian. Besides being an artist, Dick Auburn was also-in a secondary kind of way-a jolly, genial, good looking and perfectly eligible young fellow. He was blessed with mercurial tenn perament, a gay humor (when un- trammeled by artistic anxieties), and an independent income. Worldly pos session, indeed, alone deterred him from enlisting in professional ranks and led him into determination to follow art for it's own sake, in sublime confidence that such a course must bring its own reward. When at work Dick wore professorial spectacles ; al all other times he sported smart. looking single eye glass. The change thus wrought in his appearance wal typical of the contrast between tht light hearted young blade and tho anxious, care-ridden travailler in ar "a contrast which nobody who spenr day in Dicks company could fail tt remark.
 Every art demands an apprentice ship; Dick Auburn's art was no eS ception to this rule. The first stag, in Dicks apprenticeship was embodied in course of lessons (thrown in witl the necessary "plant') at a certain pal ace of art in Regent street. The sec ond stage entailed lonely hours in cellar remote from solar beams, whenc, issued smells and vapors the most vile Dick himself would follow these nasa invaders from the underworld, look ing pale and careworn, and wearing on his hands the stains-not, indeed of blood, but of some virulent chemi cal compound far less easy to expunge The third and last of the elementary stages brought forth islanders in DOT traiture on all Dicks relations ant and many of his friends, not to speal of elliptical libels on such architectu ral accommodation as the neighbor hood afforded. But Dick rose supe rior to the very frank discouragemen of coldly critical relatives and tn sickening chill born of reiterated fail ure. In six months, thanks to stub born effort and pliable purse, h became not only an ambitious, but highly accomplished amateur photog rapher.
 But to come to Dick Auburn's on photographic blunder-for he persist that it is the only mistake of a gros kind he ever made during the whole o his artistic experience :; at any rate, i is the only one of which (to speal very literally positive evidence ha been preserved. There stands on tn Middlesex side, somewhere betwee Richmond and Hampton court, quit the most charming villa, for it's size that can be found anywhere on eithe bank of the Thames. Itis built of re' brick and is a modern version Q Gothic architecture, with quaint littl points and acute angles; it is sur rounded by unaiestfc cefiars which ii