Percivale had called, and that mamma
was busy, and would I mind if she brought him up to the study.
"Not in the least, my dear," I answered; "I shall be very glad to see him."
"Not much of weather for your sacred craft, Percivale," I said as he
entered. "I suppose, if you were asked to make a sketch to-day, it would be
much the same as if a stupid woman were to ask you to take her portrait?"
"Not quite so bad as that," said Percivale.
"Surely the human face is more than nature."
"Nature is never stupid."
"The woman might be pretty."
"Nature is full of beauty in her worst moods; while the prettier such a
woman, the more stupid she would look, and the more irksome you would feel
the task; for you could not help making claims upon her which you would
never think of making upon Nature."
"I daresay you are right. Such stupidity has a good deal to do with moral
causes. You do not ever feel that Nature is to blame."
"Nature is never ugly. She may be dull, sorrowful, troubled; she may be
lost in tears and pallor, but she cannot be ugly.
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