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Updated: May 28, 2025
Everything annoyed him these days. He fidgeted, slapped one knee violently over the other, and jerked the Signal open as if he would rend it sheet from sheet. "Hu-u-m, hu-e-e-u-m hum!" droned Mrs. Coleman, her eyes fixed upon a large chromo of the Virgin Mary and the Infant Jesus hanging upon the opposite wall. Perspiration broke out in beads upon her husband's brow.
The chromo of "Sunset at Niagara Falls" was remarkable chiefly for its lack of resemblance either to Niagara or a sunset. He was inspecting this work of art when Miss Phipps entered the room. She was surprised to see him. "Mercy on us!" she exclaimed. "WHAT in the world are you doin' downstairs here?"
To say, as some do, that there is no difference between Treasure Island and a cheap tale of blood and thunder, is equivalent to saying that there is no difference between the Sistine Madonna and a chromo Virgin. The Personal Essay is a peculiar form of literature, entirely different from critical essays like those of Matthew Arnold and from purely reflective essays, like those of Bacon.
It was very simple and neat, with the small wooden bedstead corded with rope, the poor hickory rocking-chair, the flaunting chromo of the Holy Family, the sprig of blessed palm, the shrine of the Virgin, the print skirts hanging on the wall, the stockings lying across a chair, the bits of ribbon on the bed.
The big oaken chairs, graced with rude carvings, were well enough, but that was the stopping place. There was no soap, no matches, no looking-glass except a metal one, about as powerful as a pail of water. And not a chromo. I had been used to chromos for years, and I saw now that without my suspecting it a passion for art had got worked into the fabric of my being, and was become a part of me.
"And I want that painting at any price, if you will ever sell it," cried the Doctor. "I will paint one for each of the company except Sing. That apathetic heathen would not care half so much for it as he would for a highly colored chromo." "Don't be so hard upon poor Sing. I am sure that he would be just delighted with one of those paintings," said Mattie. "Call him in and let's see.
This possibility of rare beauty made her scars and burns more pitiful, for if a cheap chromo has a smirch across its face, we think it a matter of no moment, but we deplore the smallest scratch or blur on any work of real art. Lydia felt a little less bitter and hopeless about life when she sat in front of her own open fire, after her usual twilight walk.
The rest of the room remained in a greenish shadow which discreetly veiled the outline of an old-fashioned mahogany bedstead surmounted by a chromo of a young lady in a night-gown who clung with eloquently-rolling eyes to a crag described in illuminated letters as the Rock of Ages; and against the unshaded windows two rocking-chairs and a sewing-machine were silhouetted on the dusk.
Can they be taught to care for my impression of the trotting-match at the Pymantoning County Fair, as much as they would for a chromo of the same thing, and be made to feel that there was something more in it perhaps?" He sat fronting her, with his head down over the hat he held between his hands; now he lifted his face and looked into hers.
With the exception of the novel now and then which touches some religious problem or some socialistic speculation or uneasiness, or is a special freak of sensationalism, the novels which suit the greatest number of readers are those which move in a plane of absolute mediocrity, and have the slightest claim to be considered works of art. They represent the chromo stage of development.
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