United States or Andorra ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
When I got there they were all over the houseboat like flies, painting and varnishing and fixing up the flagpole, and I could hear Pee-wee as usual, shouting away. Jiminy, but it sounded good. Then I could hear somebody say, "Well, well better late than never," and I saw it was our scoutmaster, Mr. Ellsworth. He took a day off to help the fellows.
To varnish a rod in December proves that one possesses either a dilatory or a childishly anticipatory mind. But before uncorking the varnish bottle, it occurred to me to examine a dog-eared, water-stained fly-book, to guard against the ravages of possible moths. This interlude proved fatal to the varnishing. A half hour went happily by in rearranging the flies.
I have back doorsteps to be made, and troughs, screens, and what not; papering, painting, and varnishing, hitherto neglected, to be completed; also spring house-cleaning; also dressmaking for one bride and three ordinary females; also and and 's wardrobes to be overlooked; also carpets to be made and put down; also a revolution in the kitchen cabinet, threatening for a time to blow up the whole establishment altogether."
She examined the signature, peering through her eyeglass, close to the canvas. "Yes, I knew it was. Michel Zichy!" This name of "Michel!" suddenly pronounced, sped like an arrow through Marsa's heart. She closed her eyes as if to shut out some hateful vision, and abruptly quitted the Baroness, who proceeded to analyze Zichy's portrait as she did the pictures in the salon on varnishing day.
We visited Skye and Rum, the latter of which islands was once occupied as a deer forest by the present Lord Salisbury's grandfather. Rum is infested by mosquitoes, which almost stung us to death. Lord Salisbury told a friend that he protected himself from their assaults by varnishing his person completely with castor oil. The friend asked him if this was not very expensive.
One day, during varnishing time in the exhibition, an eminent portrait painter was at work on the hand of one of his pictures; he turned to the Keeper, who was near him, and said, "Fuseli, Michael Angelo never painted such a hand." "No, by Pluto," retorted the other, "but you have, many!"
And is not tragic dignity justified in varnishing, with other compost than the dregs of Rome, the exit of the last true Cæsar of the Augustan family? For all the rest, good manager, provide me actors, and I am even now uncertain such is my weakness whether this skeleton might not at some time be clad with flesh and skin, and a decent Roman toga.
The providers of the feast were not so much in evidence as their wives and daughters; the artist often affects to despise the occasion, and contents himself with a general survey frequently limited to his own pictures on Varnishing Day. The Hanging Committee had dealt kindly with Lightmark's Academy picture.
"It's a pity this isn't at the north pole," said the professor, who was varnishing dried fish in the cabin, where this conversation took place. "Why?" asked Frank. "Because, if it had been, there might have been a polar bear on that iceberg. I have read that sometimes they drift away on bergs that become detached and are sighted by steamers quite far south."
When quite dry it may be pared down carefully with a sharp knife, or if not manageable on the curve of the rib, a chisel of size according to the amount of room; being a narrow slip, after the colouring down and varnishing has taken place, it will be but slightly noticeable.
Word Of The Day