Page:Morley--Travels in Philadelphia.djvu/180

 leaned from giddy office window-sills noting down colors, contours and the aspect of the city from various viewpoints. Time and again watchmen and policemen took him to the station house as a suspected spy until his errand was explained to the city authorities and he was given an authoritative passport. But his passion for painting snow scenes and his desire to crown handicapped years of study by a really first-rate canvas spurred him on. He had spent the previous summer in getting the topography of the city by heart, mapping the course of various streets until he knew them house by house. Then, when the bitterest winter in our history came along, the snow that bothered most of us was just what he had yearned for. He revelled in the serene sparkling colors of the winter twilight, when blazing windows cast their radiance across the milky whiteness and the sky shimmers a clear gem-like emerald and blue and mother-of-pearl.

Even those who know the city through a long lifetime of street wandering will admit the difficulty of representing the vast area as it would be seen from an imaginary gazing-point high in air. Infinite problems of perspective, infinite details of accuracy and patient verification must enter into such a work. But the artist never wavered through his long task. The sketches he had made through that long blizzard winter were gradually put on his big canvas through the hot days of last summer. Undoubtedly it was a happy task, working on that