Page:Hopkinson Smith--armchair at the inn.djvu/344

 She displayed the same fine insight when, dinner over, she talked to Louis of his out-door work—especially the whirl and slide of his water.

“You will forgive a woman, Monsieur Louis, who is old enough to be your great-grandmother, when she tells you that, fine as your pictures are—and I know of no painter of our time who paints water as well—there are some things in the out of doors which I am sure you will yet put into your canvases. I am a fisherman myself, and have thrashed many of the brooks you have painted, and there is nothing I love so much as to peer down into the holes where the little fellows live—way down among the pebbles and the brown moss and green of the water-plants. Can’t we get this—or do I expect the impossible? But if it could be done—if the bottom as well as the surface of the water could be given—would we not uncover a fresh hiding-place of nature, and would not you—you, Monsieur Louis—be doing the world that much greater service?—the pleasure being more ours than yours—your reward being the giving of that pleasure to us. I hope you will all forgive me, but it has been such an inspiration to meet you all. I get so smothered