MY LITTLE BIT OF LUCK.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17632, 8 December 1922, Page 11

MY LITTLE BIT OF LUCK.

■ —♦- I This is a true tale {writes a London j correspondent). We were at an auction, my wife and I, in the outskirts of London. Why we went there I hardly know, but I think it. was dogs—the sort you put inside the fender. "How much for this lot?" said the auctioneer. "Two miniatures by John Smart. Five shillings I'm bid." It was I who bid the ss. It was a curious thing for mo to do, for what I know iibout pictures is not worth knowing. I wanted no pictures. iiut uobiAiy tfiee waiiwu tiiem, and so X had to have tiiein. On tao way ftome my wife paid me compliments. "it was quite clever of you to notice the portraits. 1 tiimk femart was a well-Known painter.'' The next day found me in the public library reading all about Jonu bin art. He was indeed a well-known painter, a regular swell in the miniature line. And on the back of . the gift frame was marked in plain figures: "Portraits of the first Duke and Duchess of , bv John Smart." "Before I did anything else I determined to consult a connoisseur. I selected the principal member of a great firm of auctioneers. ° He was vastly interested. "If these are genuine Smarts," he said, "they are worth icy tiling from eight to nine hundred pounds apiece. But have you had them but of the frame?". I replied I had not. "Of*course that would settle it 'one war or - the other," ho observed. "Otherwise you cannot warrant them, and possibly they -might fetch only twenty pounds at one of our sales. Perhaps it would be best to leave it at that. They are sweet little things." I told him I would let him know later on if I wanted to sell them, and then I wrote to.tho present duke, as follows: * "I nicked up these miniatures by an accident. They are alleged to be by john Smart, but I am no judge of things like these. Would your grace like to have them | His grace did: rather want to havo them after he had had a look at them, but his difficulty was about the price. He said he hardly knew what he ought to give, so perhaps I would tell him what I thought fair. , It wavS at this point that my luck fell through. Perhaps it was my honesty, but it mav have been greed, Anynoyv, I went off "to » really pood live artist and told , him all about it- , . m He inspected my miniatures. Then , l,e got a"magnifying-gla» and handed j it to me. "You see !' he said. There were a number of little dots all ii „ surface of the pictures. ° V <<Pr&" hfsaid. "How odd you didn't know! But thev are exquisitely done No value whatever. _ The miniatures. are now, urmy din-ing-room, pinned m * bed light.. "Ancestors 1'!