Ever since he could remember, he had been unhappy from the lack of the beautiful in the surroundings of his daily life.

His father had been poor; his mother had been an invalid; and neither father nor mother had a trace of the artistic temperament.

From what long-forgotten ancestor in his plain, hard-working family had come Stephen's passionate love of beauty, nobody knew.

It was the despair of his father, the torment of his mother.

From childhood to boyhood, from boyhood to manhood, he had felt himself needlessly hurt and perversely misunderstood on this one point.