morning, noon
And once he had cut off part of the skirt of his Sunday coat , taking it in his blindness for an old one , to clean his palette with ; and it was thought , by the boys , that it was the unseemly result of this rash act , as disclosed at church the following Sunday morning , which had led to the poor old man 's dismissal . But from him John had learnt a good deal about oil-painting -- something too of anatomy -- though more of this last from that old book -- Albinus , was it ? -- that he had found in his father 's stock . He could see himself lying on the floor -- poring over the old plates , morning , noon , and night -- then using a little lad , his father 's apprentice , to examine him in what he had learnt -- the two going about arm-in-arm -- Backhouse asking the questions according to a paper drawn up by John -- ` How many heads to the deltoid ? ' -- and so on -- over and over again -- and with what an eagerness , what an ardour ! -- till the brain was bursting and the hand quivering with new knowledge -- and the power to use it . 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 .