"Oh, no," said Lady Hilda; "be sure the painters rather followed the public preference than directed it. Poets lead; painters only mirror. I like this San Cipriano very much. They did not say too much of it. It is left to dust and damp. Could I buy it do you think?"
"I dare say,—I will inquire for you to-morrow. We sell anything now. When the public debt is a little heavier, and the salt tax is protested against, we shall sell the Transfiguration—why not?—we have a copy at S. Peter's. Indeed, why keep the S. Cecilia doing nothing in a dark old city like Bologna, when its sale with a few others might make a minister or a senator well off for life?"
"Do not be so bitter, Paolo," said the Marchesa Nina, "you might have been a minister yourself."
"And rebuilt Palestrina out of my commission on the tax on cabbages! Yes, I have lost my opportunities."
The Lady Hilda was gazing at the clouds of angels in the picture, who bore aloft the martyred souls in their immortal union; and from them
