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Velasquez had been in the studio of Pacheco at Seville for five years. During that time he filled the days with work–joyous, eager work. He produced a good many valuable pictures and a great many sketches, which were mostly given away. Yet today, Seville, with her splendid art-gallery and her hundreds of palaces, contains not a single specimen of the work of her greatest son.

It was a rather daring thing for a young man of twenty-four to knock boldly at the gates of Royalty. But the application was made in Velasquez’s own way. All of his studies, which the critics tauntingly called “tavern pieces,” were a preparation for the life and work before him. He had mastered the subtlety of the human face, and had seen how the spirit shines through and reveals the soul.

To know how to write correctly is nothing–you must know something worth recording. To paint is nothing–you must know what you are portraying. Velasquez had become acquainted with humanity, and gotten on intimate terms with life. He had haunted the waysides and markets to good purpose; he had laid the foundation of those qualities which characterize his best work: mastery of expression, penetration into character, the ability to look upon a face and read the thoughts that lurk behind, the crouching passions, and all the aspirations too great for speech. To picture great men you must be a great man.

Velasquez was twenty-four–dark, daring, silent, with a face and form that proclaimed him a strong and valiant soul. Strong men can well afford to be gentle–those who know can well cultivate silence.

The young man did not storm the doors of the Alcazar. No; at Madrid he went quietly to work copying Titians in the gallery, and incidentally painting portraits–Royalty must come to him. He had faith in his power: he could wait. His wife knew the Court would call him–he knew it, too–the Court of Spain needed Velasquez. It is a fine thing to make yourself needed.

Nearly a year had passed, and Velasquez gave it out quietly that he was about to return to his home in Seville. Artistic Madrid rubbed its eyes. The Minister of State, the great Olivarez, came to him with a commission from the King and a goodly payment in advance, begging that, as soon as he had made a short visit to Seville, he should return to Madrid. Apartments had already been set aside for him in the Alcazar Palace. Would he not kindly comply?

Such a request from the King was really equal to an order. Velasquez surely had no intention of declining the compliment, since he had angled for it most ingeniously; but he took a little time to consider it. Of course he talked it over with his wife and her father, and we can imagine they had a quiet little supper by themselves in honor of the event.

And so in the month of May, Sixteen Hundred Twenty-three, Diego de Silva Velasquez duly became a member of the Royal Household, and very soon was the companion, friend, adviser and attendant of the King–that post which he was to hold for thirty-six years, ere Death should call him hence.

“The farmer thinks that place and power are fine things, but let him know that the President has paid dear for his White House,” said the sage of Concord.

The most miserable man I ever knew was one who married a rich woman, managed her broad acres, looked after her bonds and made report of her stocks. If the stocks failed to pay dividends, or the acres were fallow, my friend had to explain why to the tearful wife and sundry sarcastic next of kin.

The man was a Jeffersonian Democrat and preached the Life of Simplicity, because we always preach about things that are not ours. He rode behind horses that had docked tails, and apologized for being on earth, to an awful butler in solemn black.