He had
been pedestrianizing for six weeks, and he was glad to rest awhile at
Engelthal. It was an economic repose, however, for he sallied forth
every morning, with his sketching tools on his back, in search of
material for new studies. Roderick's hilarity, after the first evening,
had subsided, and he watched the little painter's serene activity with a
gravity that was almost portentous. Singleton, who was not in the secret
of his personal misfortunes, still treated him with timid frankness as
the rising star of American art. Roderick had said to Rowland, at
first, that Singleton reminded him of some curious little insect with a
remarkable mechanical instinct in its antennae; but as the days went by
it was apparent that the modest landscapist's unflagging industry grew
to have an oppressive meaning for him. It pointed a moral, and Roderick
used to sit and con the moral as he saw it figured in Singleton's bent
back, on the hot hill-sides, protruding from beneath his white umbrella.
One day he wandered up a long slope and overtook him as he sat at work;
Singleton related the incident afterwards to Rowland, who, after giving
him in Rome a hint of Roderick's aberrations, had strictly kept his own
counsel.
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