Page:A Legend of Camelot, Pictures and Poems, etc. George du Maurier, 1898.djvu/179



OW, Mr. Punch, who was kept au fait of all the Spratts' doings, and who had got to take a great interest in these young people, began to opine that their position was growing somewhat perilous, and that it was high time for him to interfere, like a deus ex machinâ, before another London Season should wax and wane, when it might perhaps be too late.

For dreadful things were beginning to be said about Mrs. Spratt; much too dreadful to be repeated here!

So he discovered, in the vernal glades of Camden Town, an American sculptor—one Pygmalion F. Minnow—whose wife was ever so much taller, plumper, redder, and whiter than Mrs. Spratt, and consequently twice as beautiful. So beautiful was she, in fact, that her husband had made a life-size statue of her, in illustration of Mr. Tennyson's beautiful poem, The Mermaid; and so beautiful was this statue, that the Royal Academicians found a place of honour for it all by itself (in the refreshment-room).

And so pleased were they by the singularly modest and unassuming demeanour of the sculptor, that, very much against his will, and although there was no vacancy in their ranks, they elected him full Royal Academician on the spot, a thing that had never been done at Burlington House before. Poor Jack Spratt!

Instigated by Mr. Punch, that plucky Baronet who had bought the Little Sock-Darner, also bought The Mermaid, for his smoking-room; and not only that, but he gave the fortunate Artist a commission to execute from the same model a life-size statue of Diana, as she appeared to the enterprising but ill-fated Actæon a few moments before his untimely death; which work of Art was intended by this plucky Baronet to be a nice little surprise for his

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