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 worse than savages. Yes, so I calmly admitted to myself, for savages roamed the free wild forest, and clean spots could be found amongst the wild green woods, but here in vain would you seek for one. Her poems and statutes wuz beautiful, and she had piles on 'em, some done, some only jest begun; she wuz workin' now on a statute of Sikey, beautiful as a poem in marble could be, and as we wuz lookin' at it she sez, liftin' her large, fine eyes heavenward:

"Oh, to create, to be a creator of beauty in poem or picture or statute, it seems to make one a partner with the Deity."

"Yes," sez I, "there is a good deal of sense in that, and I fully appreciate beauty wherever I see it."

But, bein' gored by Duty, sez I, "How would it work to make your own children, of which you are the author, works of art and beauty, care for them, work at them some as you do at your own stun figgers, cuttin' off the rough edges, prunin' and cuttin' so the soul will show through the human, and they havin' the advantage over your statutes that the good work you expend on them is liable to go on to the end of time, carryin' out your lofty ideals in other lives—how would it work, Evangeline, and makin' your own home as nigh as you can like the ideal one you dote on—wouldn't it be better for you?"

She said it wouldn't work at all; the care of home and children hampered her and held her down; she preferred pure, unadulterated art, onmingled with duties.

But I sez, "Wouldn't the time to decide that question been before you volunteered to assume these cares; but after you have done so how would it work to do the very