‘I am a painter, Mr. Aylwin, and nothing more,’ he replied.  ’I could only express Philip Aylwin’s ideas by describing my picture and the predella beneath it.  Will you permit me to do so?’

‘May I ask you,’ I said, ‘as a favour to do so?’

Immediately his face became very bright, and into his eyes returned the far-off look already described.

’I will first take the predella, which represents Isis behind the Veil,’ said he.  ’Imagine yourself thousands of years away from this time.  Imagine yourself thousands of miles away, among real Egyptians.’

’Real ‘Gyptians!’ cried Sinfi.  ’Who says the Romanies ain’t real ’Gyptians?  Anybody as says my daddy ain’t a real ‘Gyptian duke’ll ha’ to set to with Sinfi Lovell.’

‘Nonsense,’ said Cyril, smiling, and playing idly with a coral amulet dangling from Sinfi’s neck; ’he’s talking about the ancient Egyptians:  Egyptian mummies, you silly Lady Sinfi.  You’re not a mummy, are you?’

‘Well, no, I ain’t a mummy as fur as I knows on,’ said Sinfi, only half-appeased; ’but my daddy’s a ’Gyptian duke for all that,—­ain’t you, dad?’

‘So it seems, Sin,’ said Panuel, ’but I ommust begin to wish I worn’t; it makes you feel so blazin’ shy bein’ a duke all of a suddent.’

‘Dabla!’ said the guest Jericho Boswell.  ’What, Pan, has she made a dook on ye?’

The Scollard began to grin.

‘Pull that ugly mug o’ yourn straight, Jim Herne,’ said Sinfi, ’else I’ll come and pull it straight for you.’

Wilderspin took no notice of the interruption, but addressed me as though no one else were within earshot.

’Imagine yourself standing in an Egyptian city, where innumerable lamps of every hue are shining.  It is one of the great lamp-fetes of Sais, which all Egypt has come to see.  There, in honour of the feast, sits a tall woman, covered by a veil.  But the painting is so wonderful, Mr. Aylwin, that, though you see a woman’s face expressed behind the veil—­though you see the warm flesh-tints and the light of the eyes through the aerial film—­you cannot judge of the character of the face—­you cannot see whether it is that of woman in her noblest, or woman in her basest, type.  The eyes sparkle, but you cannot say whether they sparkle with malignity or benevolence—­whether they are fired with what Philip Aylwin calls “the love-light of the seventh heaven,” or are threatening with “the hungry flames of the seventh hell”!  There she sits in front of a portico, while, asleep, with folded wings, is crouched on one side of her the figure of Love, with rosy feathers, and on the other the figure of Faith, with plumage of a deep azure.  Over her head, on the portico, are written the words:—­“I am all that hath been, is, and shall be, and no mortal hath uncovered my veil.”  The tinted lights falling on the group are shed, you see, from the rainbow-coloured lamps of Sais, which are countless.  But in spite of all these lamps, Mr. Aylwin, no mortal can see the face behind that veil.  And why?  Those who alone could uplift it, the figures with folded wings—­Faith and Love—­are fast asleep at the great Queen’s feet.  When Faith and Love are sleeping there, what are the many-coloured lamps of science?—­of what use are they to the famished soul of man?’