He himself was an old-fashioned artist, quite content to be "mid" or even "early" Victorian.

He still cultivated the art of historical painting, and was still as anxious as any contemporary of Frith to tell a story.

And as his manner was no less behind the age than his material, his pictures remained on his hands, while the "vicious horrors," as they seemed to him, of the younger school held the field and captured the newspapers.
But as he had some private means, and no kith or kin but his niece, the indifference of the public to his work caused him little disturbance.
He pleased his own taste, allowing himself a good-natured contempt for the work which supplanted him, coupled with an ever-generous hand for any post-Impressionist in difficulties.
On the August afternoon when Doris, escaping at last from her maids and her accounts, made her way up to the studio, for some hours' work on the last three or four illustrations wanted for a Christmas book, Uncle Charles welcomed her with effusion.
"Where have you been, child, all this time?
I thought you must have flitted entirely." Doris explained--while she set up her easel--that for the first time in their lives she and Arthur had been seeing something of the great world, and--mildly--"doing" the season.

Arthur was now continuing the season in Scotland, while she had stayed at home to work and rest.

Throughout her talk, she avoided mentioning the Dunstables.
"H'm!" said Uncle Charles, "so you've been junketing!" Doris admitted it.
"Did you like it ?" Doris put on her candid look.
"I daresay I should have liked it, if I'd made a success of it.