"Well, Mr Walkwell, how are you? Are the boys doing well?"
"Very fairly, sir, very fairly; but I have to report the new boy to
you."
"What, Shepard? Ah, I'm afraid he is a failure. Come here, Shepard!"
I got up from my seat and walked up to where Hostler and Walkwell were
standing, feeling ready to faint from nervousness.
"New boy Shepard, Mr Hostler, has told me a story. I asked him if he
could draw, and he said `No,' and I have now seen him out of his own
head draw this sketch, sir. Look at the curve of that yacht's sails;
see the way he has fore-shortened her; look how she rests on the water.
Why, for a man that's a work of art. That boy is an artist, sir, and he
told me he couldn't draw."
It is very difficult to describe my feelings during this conversation.
I had twice been surprised at discovering my ignorance during the past
few days, and now I had a surprise in discovering that I was possessed
of a skill in drawing which was above the average. I used to amuse
myself when at home in drawing on a slate vessels and boats that I had
seen when I had gone down to Lymington or Beaulieu, but that there was
any great difficulty in drawing such things I had never imagined, or had
I the slightest idea that other boys could not do so well--if not better
than I did.
I was certainly pleased to find that there was something in which I was
not a dunce; and although I was a laughing-stock of the school on
account of my ignorance of mathematics and Euclid, I was held up as
something unusually clever in drawing.
"Shepard," said Mr Hostler, "I am glad to find you can do something
well, but it's a pity you have wasted your time in learning only
drawing, to the neglect of mathematics. Drawing never passed a boy into
the Academy, and it doesn't count much afterwards. Very well, Mr
Walkwell, make a good artist of him, and he'll then have a profession
always ready for him in case he wants it; but I wish, for his sake, he'd
some knowledge of Euclid, and less of drawing."
From that day Mr Walkwell paid great attention to my instruction, and I
improved rapidly under his tuition, and after some dozen lessons I was
considered the best in the drawing-class.