This she did; and as
the instrument proved entirely satisfactory, my duty was then to
proceed about our business and remember that better an egg to-day
than a hen to-morrow. Only an artist's fond pride intervened;
nothing but my vanity, my consciousness of power to excel, upset the
rightful climax. We were, indeed, both artists, but how incomparably
the greater she! How severe and direct, how scornful of needless
elaboration! She belonged, mind and body, to the finest period of
Greek art, and echoed their stern, soulless simplicity and
perfection. Had she won her way with me, we should be living now to
enjoy the fruits of our accomplishment.
But though she did not win her way, yet, in defeat, her final,
glorious deed was to intercept the death intended for me, that I
might still live. Loyal to the last, she sacrificed herself,
forgetting, in that supreme moment, how life for me without her
could possess no shadow of compensation. When Jenny shook off the
dust of the world, I was ready and willing to do the same.
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