The institution has, indeed, continued to our own time; the garret is still the usual receptacle of the philosopher and poet; but this, like many ancient customs, is perpetuated only by an accidental imitation, without knowledge of the original reason for which it was established.

The garret was a world several centuries old that now belonged entirely to him and adjusted itself to all his fancies.

Then Leonardo's 'Art of Painting' and Reynolds's Discourses'both discovered in the shop, and studied incessantly, till the boy of eighteen felt himself the peer of any Academician, and walked proudly down the Kendal streets, thinking of the half-finished paintings in his garret at home, and of the dreams, the conceptions, the ambitions of which that garret had already been the scene.

Garrets are delicious places in any case, for people of thoughtful, imaginative temperament.

Mrs. Katy Scudder's garret was not an exception to the general rule.