The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1904-03-04
An Artists
Dream.
BY s. RHEH ROMAN.
NAVID HENDERsON'S small st,

4
~ built On the slope Of the mountain,
with it's outlook on the distant lake
and a background of a great impene-
trable forest growth, became the scene
of tremendous activity when Silvia be-
gan to take weekly lessons In drawing
and painting, while listening to
David's desultory talk on art and
things artistic, bright, reminiscent
gleamings of former student days,
while wandering abroad among old
world centers of ancient and modern
civilization.
At given hour Silvia would dash
up to the door gay, brilliant and en-
thusiastic, while Gorky followed, smil-
ing and pleased at her delight and
carrying her drawing materials.
And when she was installed before
her easel and David Henderson had
begun his critical and severe fault-find-
ing as to the work done since her last
lesson, Gorky, with a chuckle of de-
light at the bold defense Silvia always
made, would go back to his multifa-
lious occupations, reappearing with
unerring punctuality when the stipu-
lated hours had expired.
For the original hour, grudgingly
given by Henderson, had been largely
extended to that unexpected pupil
which fate and accident thrust upon
him in the heart of the Blue Ridge,
where he had come for rest and recre-
alton and to steep soul and magma
ton in the magnificent scenes and
sights of those misty end beautiful
ranges and to get rid of the dust and
chimney stacks, electric cars and the
monotonous pleasures of a big city,
where he lived. and sold pictures, re-
ceived a heterogeneous collection of
friends, both Of bohemia and the beau
monde, among the picturesque confu-
sion of his big suite of rooms.
Invitations always poured in on
David, and many mQnogramed notes
in feminine handwriting were left in
his letter box, and to secure time for
the splendid work which made him ia
nous as one of the foremost American
artists Of to-day David Henderson's
clever and immovable Japanese serv-
ant had to mount guard at his door
and lie to all corners that he had gone
out of town.
So, somewhat worn in appearance
and cynically at odds with social ext
gencies, David Henderson had slipped
away on southbound train to the
Businesses of the great solitary noun
tains around Blowing Rock
1t was only when the summer came.
smoking in contemplative silence and
sitting on his porch breathing the
ozone of the frs and pines, towering
above his rambling picturesque cot
tage in the divine solitudes and fading
twilight Of June. that David Hender-
sons artistic enthusiasm began to re-
vive, with the great undying passion
of the artist and an Indifference equally
as great for his fellow-men, which spe-
cially included womankind.
David Henderson keenly regretted
his promise made under a sudden i'm
pulse to give lessons to a presumably
crude country girl, for the queer rea-
son that her mother, if faithfully Dor
trayed by miniature, had been beauti-
full.
Leternel feminin. How unescapa-
ble,' David murmured impatiently
while waiting for the advent of his un-
welcome pupil.
But life holds some delightful sur
prises as we'll as many pitfalls and
cruel dangers, and the handsome youne
girl, whose keen intelligence and quick
artistic sentiment he soon discovered
were as remarkable as her beauty WAS
one of them. ..
The original hour. devoted to show
Ing Silvia how to seize the wonderful
tones and shades and coloring of the
majestic scenery around, how to fix on
the canvas the paling distances, tho
mist of twilight and the sweep of the
hills. in :heir sunbathed beauty. was