Part 1 — THE SEA.
Reading edition
BY EVA L. OGDEN.
She was rich and of high degree; A poor and unknown artist he. "Paint me," she said, "a view of the sea." So he painted the sea as it looked the day That Aphrodite arose from its spray; And it broke, as she gazed in its face the while Into its countless-dimpled smile. "What a pokey stupid picture," said she; "I don't believe he can paint the sea!"
Then he painted a raging, tossing sea, Storming, with fierce and sudden shock, Wild cries, and writhing tongues of foam, A towering, mighty fastness-rock. In its sides above those leaping crests, The thronging sea-birds built their nests. "What a disagreeable daub!" said she; "Why it isn't anything like the sea!"
Then he painted a stretch of hot, brown sand, With a big hotel on either hand, And a handsome pavilion for the band,— Not a sign of the water to be seen Except one faint little streak of green. "What a perfectly exquisite picture," said she; "It's the very image of the sea." —Century Magazine.