The Craftsman - 1909 - 02 - February.pdf

7/27/2019 The Craftsman - 1909 - 02 - February.pdf

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THECRAFTSMANVOLUME xv FEBRUARY, 1909 NUMBER 5

aNItemRed M itt s : Fr om a Paint ing by H il da Bckhcr . . . FrontispieceIs American Art Captive to the Dead Past ? . By TFi l l i~ l , I I L. Pr i i c 515What Does the National Academy of Design Stand for ? By Giks Edghm 520Has It at Present a Value to the American Art Public ?I l lust ra tedThe Abiding Lesson of Gothic Architecture . By Er l L CSt : I . Bd c l z cWcY 533All Its Beauty and Inspiration the Outgrowth of Sound ConstructionI l lust ra tedThe Cost of a Game: A Story . . . . By Eva AIaddu ~ 549The Real Drama of the Slums . . . BJ ~Char les Wiwcr Barr r l l 559-As Told in John Sloans EtchingsI l lust ra tedThe Spell of Ntirnberg . . . . . By Phil ip Vu11 qlstym 565I l lust ra tedReclaiming the Desert . . . . By Forbes Li mhn y 573The Transformation of Arid Lands into Farms and Homes:The Quickening of NevadaI l lust ra tedThe Great White Plague . . . = , By Chcvles H clrsourt 585Its Cost, Cure and PreventionAmong the CraftsmenTwo Craftsman Houses: One Designed for Building in Town . I I D . 591or Country, and the Other a FarmhouseI l lust ra ted .California Barn Dwellings and the Attractive Bungalows . . . . D . 598which have Grown Out of the IdeaI l lztstratsdThe Craftsmens GuildThe National Arts Club of New York . -I l lust ra ted By Gadncr Tcdl 604Silk Dyeing (Continued) . . . . . By Prof. Charl es P& w 614Als ik Kan: . . . . . . . y . By !.Izc di tor 618Music: Notes: Reviews . . . . . . . . _ 622

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Fr om the National Academy of Design, 1938.See page po.

RED MITTS : HILDA BELCHER, PAINTER.



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mfi&THERAFTSMAN?r

GUSTAV STICKLEY. EDITOR AND PUBLISHERVOLUME XV FEBRUARY, 1909 NUMBER 5

IS AMERICAN ART CAPTIVE TO THE DEADPAST? BY WILLIAM L. PRICE

long, I wonder, will the Renascence hold us in itssp? How long will the fetters of the past bindus to the arts of other days ? How long will Art beled captive to education and be shackled to precedent ?For that period following the glorious, if barbaric,Gothic age, which we call the Renascence, was forArchitecture no re-birth of art, but a grave-digging res-urrection. The people of that day, realizin 8 the crudeness and bar-,baric splendor of the Gothic, and having re iscovered the classic artand literature of Greece and Rome, made a fatal mistake. Instead ofrefining the barbaric out of their own art and keeping its glory and itsfrank expression of materials and the wants and customs of their ownday, the educated and refined said, We can never hope to equal theclassic beauty of the past; let us spend our lives in imitating it.And now the general public, especially the educated public, andthe vast majority of the artists and architects, still in the Renascence,are laying the flattering unction to their souls that we have achievedaVCFreat advance in architecture and the arts in the past twenty. years.e have awakened, it is true, but our eyes are still heavy with thesleep of the Renascence. Lulled by the slumber song of a gorgeouspast, we think to dream art back mto the hungry world. We thinkto let the mantle of our education cover the bareness of popularapathy and creative thought. We think to lift the masses to an under-standing of the excellency of revived styles and resurrected cultures,while we should be studying those very masses for an inspiration,while we should be raised to a pitch of enthusiastic interpretationof their great qualities-those very qualities of which as patriotswe boast and at which as artists we sneer. If there is no inspirationfor the architects and artists in the life of our own people, then therewill be no art of our own people, and this is the fault of the artists,not of theWhen t eople.tt e naked savage, pushed by the wants of his body, fash-ioned clay to his uses, or with rude flint tool shaped his weapons fortheir fell purpose, something happened to him. He was no longermerely a weak and naked animal in a cold and strenuous world. He had

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IS AMERICAN ART CAPTIVE?slipped into the god class. He had become a creator, a man whowills, not the blind follower of instinct or racial habit, and the taleof his birth is told in the work of his hands.with new eyes on creation.

Having created, he lookssees his fellow man, still Having fashioned for mans service hely. Yet he sees. but as trees walking, as in a glass dark-And the tale of that emotion is written large onpot and bow, or on the painted bauble for a loves sake that has be-come more than mere physical sex attraction.And this is art, fine art, all there is to art, and it is enough. Ilike to quote to my friends, the artists, the cloistered painters andsculptors, the words of Blount, The scratched line around the por-ringer and the carved motto over the cottage door,-these are thebeginning and almost the end of the fine arts.We have hedged about the artists and their work as if they weresomething apart, their works we have enshrined asselves we look upon as the inspired priests of a ho y of holies thatads, and them-common men must approach with bowed reverence.you artists, come out from your dead cloisters. But I say toCome out into thefree air where men really live, and take the shoes from off your feet,for this is holyinterpreters of li e as it is, and proround. You are not the end and aim of life, buthets of life as it shall be. Comeout as the sav e did and tell the ta e of life, and if that life be savageand vulgar, tel the tale so that it will shame the vulgarity and hftthe vulgar; but tell the tale, for your job is the same as that of the: to show to your fellow men the new point of view, the newKZr in common things, to trace dimly the paths of promise, tobreak a few steps in the steep path of the hill difficult; and this mustbe done in the sight of the people. You must also sit at the door ofyour tents to chrp the stone and mold the pregnant clay.Oscar Wilde says, The educated mans idea of art is always theart that has been; the artists idea of art is the art that is to be.And he knew.and So if you would be hailed by men as great artistsknow edge.reat architects, build according to your knowledge and theirSit s&&d in your Renascence, but if you would leadmen on to greater heights and new achievements, build from yoursecret souls.intuition rule. Let your lmowledge guide and conserve, but let your0 , YOU artists who think yourselves above the pots and trapings of a Fommon life-you who think fine art above If-echipping of useful stones and the fashioning of the common-prlace-you are not fit to shape the instruments of mans daily needs.ou who think that art is to paint silly pictures for silly gilded frames,516



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IS AMERICAN ART CAPTIVE?whose reatest ambition it is to have them hung in some silly gildedLuxem %ourg, come out into life and help the people to build a newart for a new day. Better, a thousand times better, the rock-ribbedGothic of a Whitman than all the curled darlings and simperingniceties of a borrowed culture. And you painters and sculptorswho think to get closer to architecture by decorating the stolen andeffeminate glories of our modern Renascence, who in the end onlyemphasize the emptiness of the temple by accenting or i! noring itsbanalities, come out from among the tombs, join your fel ow crafts-men, the quarryman and the woodman, and realize that the corner-stone comes before the capstone. Realize that until the work of ourhands in fashioning the necessities of life has been glorified, therecan be no art that shall move mens souls.And you architects who think that architecture can be made inoffices, that paper and pencil can express the hopes and aspirations ofa people, learn thatdrop architecture B ou cannot save your souls alone, that you cannotown on a waiting earth like manna. Archi-tecture comes up from the soil, not down from the skies. And it isthe mother of arts because not man but men must create it. Onlyas you can influence your fellows, the stone-mason and the joiner,can you hope for architecture.And your great organizations of builders and of workmen, theyhold out no hope. And your machines!not 4 ram work, but 20 work, shall they help.

Only as they free men,he artists of the past about whose graves you linger, who were

buirdithe ? Not the pattern-makers, but the doers. Most of the greatngs of the ast are bad architecturally, but they aref reat ascraftsmanship. hey shadow forth the hopes and the fai ures oftheir makers.into them. They are alive today because mens lives were builtYour classmen in architecture can imitate them but theycannot make them. They can point out their failures and their in-consistencies, but with all their machines and knowledge and organi-zation they can of themselves no more create architecture than thearchitects of that day could. The difference is that those men didnot try.them. They designed with their fellows, the craftsmen, not forThey accepted the limitations of materials of use and of theworkman, and no sculptor was too great or painter too exalted tointer ret the common life around them, and if their madonnas werenot s ewish, at least they were maternal. If the Gothic sculptureswere not natural, at least they were architectural. They tell no taleof anatomy, but they tell the tale of a peoples aspirations. But, sa sShaw, your modern academicians thmk to paint Giottos pictures witKout Giottos inspiration and correct his perspective into the bargain.

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IS AMERICAN ART CAPTIVE?U TIL we get craftsmen who are architects and architects whoare craftsmen, we shall have no architecture. And until weget architecture, or set ourselves in the way of getting it, weshall have no fine art. For fine art is only the fine way of doingthings that are worth the doina .whether they be laymen or arc And as long as our educated men,itects, think that the Madison Squaretower which has no meaning, is greater than its prototype, the Gir-alda, we shall build Madison Square towers, we shall build marbletemples for banks, Italian alacesvu1 P (nearly Italian) for dwellings for thePar rich, and English vi las in miniature for the vulgar poor. Wesha 1 build Colonial houses such as the Colonials never budt, for cul-tured do-nothings, and hotels that are not even French, for snobs andcommercial travelers. If our American life is half-way worth the boastwe make for it, why is it not good enough to be our inspiration?If our rich men are worth catenng to in paint and marble, why arethey not worth inte a reting in brick and stone?worth defending an If our Republic isupholding, is not its seat in Washington orelsewhere worth housing in something better or at least more rep-resentative than the cast-off vestures of monarchy? And that ourcapitols speak more of feeble-minded monarchy than of strong youngDemocracy I challen e anyone to deny.There is on1i! ane t ing worse than ignoring precedent, and that isfollowing it. arlyle says, Ori inality1 does not consist in beindifferent, but in being sincere. nd there is not only the very souof individuality in art, but also of style in art. For if we were sincere,our work would vary from type as we individually vary, but alsoas we are much alike in the same environment, so our sincerework would have much in common, and that is the thing we callStyle. Not a fixed form, but an expandin expression of a commonimpulse. So if we were sincere as we are q ke our fathers, so wouldour works follow theirs, not as imitation but as like expression, and aswe are different and beyond our fathers, so would our work be differ-ent and beyond their work.Not the feeble, book-learned Colonial of our day, for we areno lon er colonists, but the full-blooded expression of a giant Democ-Bacy ; t e strong, rude conqueror of a continent, not the feeble de-Pendent of an outworn social creed. And some there are, gropinor this real Renascence, not a resurrection, mind you, but a re-birt fiof Art. Here and there a free man lifts his head. Here and therea potter lifts his clay out of the common plane of style. Here andthere a carver or a sculptor dares say his new days say. And archi-tecture is creeping to our doors almost unnoticed, close to the soil,still finding its birth, as always, in the simple dwellings of the country-518



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IS AMERICAN ART CAPTIVE?side. And architects whose great and costly buildings are merebanal European architecture, and not true even to that, are hidingaway in the countryside cotta esthat are neither French nor 5

and country houses that are real,-they are not afraid. nglish, that are just houses, for hereHere they dare be themselves and dare franklyexpress their fellows.But our big buildings! It is to laugh. Five-story bronze andsteel buildings masquerading as marble tern les, orders piled onorders, detail thrown bodily to the top of high ifuildings for the birdsto see. Marble palaces at Newport, chateaux on Fifth Avenue,alleged Pantheons on Broad Street, marble detail cast in clay or pain-fully wrought in granite. Wood fashioned like stone and stone likewood. As an architect from Ghent, recently here, said, Oh, thatour forests were fire- roof and your buildmgs were not. I cameitere full of hope to fincf a great, new, modern architecture, and I findnothing but bad European architecture. And he had been to Bos-ton, too, and to New York and Albany and Philadelphia. But hehad not seen our nestlings, our suburbs, our little real houses in thecountry.Our hope of art, like our hope of health, lies in the pregnant callof Back to Nature. Back to the fields and forests for our nerve-broken health. Back to man and his needs, his common daily needs,for our art.And, my friends, dont fool yourselves that there is any other way.Look at your own achievements. Look at the architectural triumphsof even ten years ago, and ask yourselves if they will live, if they haveanything to say, any new thoughts to thunder down the hollow vaultof time. We are a people in the forming, and so have all peoplesbeen when they really lived, and we must build for the moment andPo on, and if you dont care to build for the scrap heap, dont build,or it will all go there. But if you build trul , some stones shall stand,some detail will cling to the robes of art ancf become part of the greatwhole. Better to lay two bricks together in the new way that tellsa tale, than to build a temple for the money changers with no thoughtin it less than two thousand years dead.

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WHAT DOES THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OFDESIGN STAND FOR HAS IT AT PRESENTA VALUE TO THE AMERICAN ART PUBLIC?BY GILES EDGERTONII IS worth while stopping to think just what an an-nual art exhibition hke the National Academy ofDesign stands for. Should it be an opportunity forour nation to inform itself as to its realits development in the past, its hope or the future ?regress in art,Should it thus from year to s:ear stand as a record ofthe best we can achieve? hould we look to it foran opportunitB to understand accomplishment and to find ins ira-tion? Shoul our mature men go to it to watch the progress oP ournational art, and our students to realize the high standards demandedof them ?changin , In other words, is the Academy to be re arded as an everis its B advancing expression of the living art oB America ? Andva ue to us our opportunity to study and profit by this growth ?Or must we accept this famous institution merely as the artopinion of the academic few who invariably see originality coupledwith anarchy, and who reticently offer the public year after year aElrogramme of cold-served repetition, so that an Academ catalogueecomes as familiar readin P as ones visiting list ? Outsi cr of Amer-ica it is an accepted fact t ather art, indigenous growth, witBrowth is what a country demands inroots deep in the soil of the nation.But for years past America has been advised to import her art,-in fact, to import all forms of culture. She has been soundly scoldedover and over again for any attempt at originality, and has beenwarned that progress in science and money-makinfor her, but that a genuine art expression she alone o

were possibleall the nationsin the world was to be debarred from.more progressive than this. Of course, the Academy is farIt does not insist that American f icturesand sculpture shall all be inspired abroad, althou h it still ho ds thisview in regard to architecture, but it does feel tflat any actual vig-orous pulsating growth in art is something to be a little nervousabout, and which on the whole is rather safer to reject than hang.While as a matter of fact what we need just now in America is thisdefinite expression of the Americanvidual expression of it, regardless o9 uality, and every possible indi-blunders or difficulties or un-certainties. If we are over-energetic, over-strenuous, over-confident,lacking reserve and subtlety, then let us express these things as wefeel them, as we live them. It is only thus that our art may have a

Permanent significance to us and to others. And of course, withal,et us be students (as was said by Mr. Henri in a recent issue of TEE



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SIGNIFICANCE OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMYCRAFTSMAN) of technique, every variation of technique to fit everyvariation of inspiration, until a mans medium in art is as fluid as histhought, and ms thought a direct expression of his life.

And thus, necessarily, as our civilization grows and changes, asour standards advance and our existence is more beautiful, our ex-hibitions of painting and sculpture,-and, let us trust, eventuallyour architecture, -must also grow and change, becoming more andmore intimate to us, more and more bone of our bone. And thenif we blunder in thought and feeling, we shall show these blundersin our art, and it is better so, for in no other way can we truly under-stand ourselves, our failures and our high achievement.U QUESTIONABLY, th ere are isolated moments of genuinedelight at the present Academy exhibit; there are Sar ents andChases, some lovely pictures by Miss Comans, by Bt e&eld,by E. H. Potthast, by Warren Eaton and Paul Cornoyer, by Walcottand Lillian Genth, all of which you are glad to meet again and again,and live happily with ever after. But why not, with these mostsignificant and valuable old friends, present others who are equallyworthy,- artists who are seein the life of their own land clearly, withall its extraordinary lights an% shadows, from lowliest narrow streetto the last glimmering li ht overhead, seein all independently, yetin just relation to life anf art and to the funf amental conditions of astrange new civilization.For truly we need more freshness, more ori nality, more insularfeelin , and it is to an academy that we should ook for such growth.% ffIt is t e leadinwith open min %spirits of the Academy, our famous men, who shouldestimate, appraise and judge what of our art meansgrowth and what atrophi , for upon them alone can we depend for thereal encouragement an the practical help which means a rapidflowerin of art (or the contrary) in America. And yet, alas, it is tothe sing e-man or the small group exhibit we actually do look forthe very work which should by rights spring from an academy.And as matters stand, in many ways the single-man display of pic-tures or sculpture is the most satisfactory form of an exhibition whichthe modern American artist can hope for his work outside of hisown studio; but this is often difficult of accomplishment, expensiveand affords the eneral public who are seeking art cultivation noopportunity for tE at valuable study which comes from contrast andcomparison. Thus we need the Academy or an academy to do thevery work which the present institution ignores or neglects, to showUS where we stand as a nation in art matters; in fact, it seems thatthe purpose of an academy is essentially this, and that success



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SIGNIFICANCE OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMYshould be gained by the great idea, the vigorous individuality, thecultivated technique. It is not as though the institution in uestionwere a shy and timid body; it is courageous to a degree in t e boldpresentation again and again of some favorite of eiPet it hesitates year after year at the unexpecte fi

hteen thirty, and, the unfamiliar.t seems to insist u on a well-worn reference for space on the wall.It hangs a picture ike Jacovellis East Side where it is a directintervention of Providence if any human beina catches a glimpseof it, and it puts on the line Bellows Up the%iver, a icture inwhich the landscaEl K

e seems to be slipping up the river, anB the riveruite uncertain w ether to continue its peaceful painted course orow inconsequentially out of the frame.Another example of Academy methods, bound to confuse theunsowar 2 histicated spectator who is seeking for ustice and virtue re-ed is the givmg of the Carnegie prize to k en31 Brown Fullersenormous acreage of canvas called The Triump of Truth overError. There is a hint from a New York critic that this pictureis the concerted work of a syndicate of geniuses. That a numberof men might conscientiously and impersonally fill up space on sucha breadth of picture seems a reasonable suin fact than that it could be the expression o any one mans concep-gestion, much more sotion of a significant contribution to American art. The idea is soworld-worn that the very figures droop with the burden of its age.The syndicate undoubtedly worked conscientiously,-they weregood craftsmen . But why should the Academy give such a giganticex ression of stupidity and impersonality the seat of honor and a%o le prize? The slpace given to this non-significant paintin couldhave supported nice y a well planned grouE

of the work oB TheEight; yet it is said that three of Geor estirrin , real, were rejected, and not a Sloan,% uks pictures, brilliant,% enri, Shmn or Prendergastare to e found on the walls, not even in the eaves, where they occa-sionallit wou d be to the credit of? find a modest restin1 place. There is one Glackens, wheremerican art to hang a dozen ; one Law-son, and a brilliant storm scene by Jonas Lie, not that Lie is one ofthe Eight, but he paints so sincerely and so vitally that one naturallyclasses him in the same group.Remington is not represented at all, although he is at present oneof the most unalterably representative American painters and sculp-tors which the nation can boast. He is in fact one of the few menin this country who has created new conditions in our art, and mustbe reckoned with as one of the revolutionary fi

Sargent dominates the whole exhibit, an%ures in our art history.would still dominateit if it were representative of the best art of our country. Most notice-

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Fr om the National Academy, I@.

PORTRAIT : HOWARD CARDINERGUSHING, PAINTER.



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THE MORNI NG HOURS: CHARLESC. CURRAN, PAINTER.



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From the Nationnl Academy of Design, rgo8.

SEA BATHS: J EAN IUAC-LANE J OHANSEN, PAINTER



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MIRTH : WILLIAM SERGEANTKENDALL, SCULPTOR.

INFANTS HEAL? : EDI TH WOOD-MAN BURROUGHS, SCULPTOR.

Prom the Noti onal Academy, I@.

PIERRE MAROT PURVES: CHESTERBEACH, SCULPTOR.

THE SKATER : ABASTENIAEEERLE, SCULPTOR.



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Fr om the National Academy,THE RIVER : JAMES PRESTON, PAINTER.BOATS AT LOW TIDE : EDWARD H. POTT-HAST, PAINTER



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SIGNIFICANCE OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMYable of this mans extraordinary work is the portrait of Mrs. JosephPulitzer; both of the Pulitzer portraits are masterpieces, most ex-traordinary psychological presentations in a few dashing inevitablestrokes of two people of most noticeable though widely divergentpersonality. Mrs. Pulitzer in hereffect of being hostess at the Aca f orgeous frame has somewhat theemy, she is so much more vividand more alive than any of the other paintings, or most of theThe illusion of life is overwhelming, and the revelation of tKeople.sonality as frank as it is definite. e per-Before these psychological mapsof Sargents one is often reminded of the little old lady who shudder-ingly faced a famous Sargent in a London gallery, and implored herniece, My dear, newer let that man paint me! And it does seem avery high standard of courage that leads men and women to facethis surgeon of the studio.

B T to return to the attitude of the Academy toward the layRublic and that of the public toward the Academy-it is per-aps best exemplified in an incident which came up in thesecuring of illustrations for this article. A photographer who hadsecured a permit to photograph in the galleries brought a collectionof rints to THE CRAFTSMAN office,-among them scarcely one ofrea f importance or significance, or valuable as an exin our art,-and the photographer explained, f ression of growthou see, I neverdream of taking any except those on the line, and then only themost po ular subjects. It wouldnt pay me to take the skied onesor anT E r the little ones; the magazines wont stand for them.us the Academy places on the line pictures of established po u-laritexhi 35

Khat have been passed upon by other committees of ot erits, and the photographer takes the biggest and most cheerfulof these, and the average magazine selects the prettiest and mostephemeral of what the photographer has thought B opular. Thuswe seem to secure a lack of thought from Alpha to mega, and theAcademy undoubtedly imagines it is giving the public what it wants,and the public has not been trained to know what it wants or thatthere is anything else to have.It has been suof view, that the wgested by an unfeeling critic with a modern pointcademy could better do justice to art in Americaif it opened its list more freely to the newcomers and establisheda separate gallesuperannuated, tx where all pictures were hung on the line for theus leaving the main galleries to be filled with thework of men who are putting into it their heart and soul as well as

ft.% This is, of course, a very revolutionary suggestion, and per-aps the superannuated room would become such good form that the5.29



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SIGNIFICANCE OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMYyounger painters would be just as unhappy as ever.course is constantly being pursued in literature. And yet thisA man who writeslives by merit alone; he must win fresh success from season to season.One great success may sell one or two second-rate books, but onlyone or two. One great poem may lead to personal popularity, buteventually the oet of the one thouwreath. And t s truth is recognize 2 ht is expected to win a freshin business, in various institu-tions ; in most hasesone record. IT of life a man is not considered a great runner forven the church withdraws and ensions its men whocan no longer stir an audience, or who have ost capacity for indi-vidual growth. And the actor and the singer, they must make goodnight after night or drift into oblivion. But in art, especial1America, it is the superannuated who often rules, the academic wL inchrejects genius and blazes a path for mediocrity.should be the final tribunal of justice for And yet the Academyan art which is even now throbbing wit%rowing American art,-the life of the mostvital, most extraordinary civilization the world has ever seen, andthe Academy should be seeking out these men, urging them tonewer and stron er effort, callin% %hem, cheering t em, insisting t for their work; should be helpingat the alleries be alive with thedominating art impulse of thrs part of %e century, and that theexhibition walls be free to all who have the idea and the abilityto express it.W ARE not a stupid people or we should not be producingeven the beginnings of such art as we are proving ourselvescapable of. And there are many of us vitally interested inthe strong work that is springing up here and there throughout theland, not only in the fine arts but in the industrial arts. One mayeven go so far as to suggest that there are those among us who donot demand the red motor car in literature, the smiling girl in por-traiture and the fake Greek column in public architecture; who arehonest1by truti seeking truth and the kind of beauty which is only revealed, and who desire the most intimate relation between our lifeand our art. There are enou h of these who would like to see theAcademy a vital asset in the f evelopment of the nation, who wouldlike to see a new kind of exhibit and even new exhibition buildings.It would be interesting to see an exhibition of three hundred andthirty-eight pictures, wrth Glackens, Henri and Shinn on the hang-ing committee. Macbeth experimented in this fashion last winterwhen he opened his galleries to The Ei ht, and couldnt findstanding room for the crowds. So it woulf seem that the public isnot averse to strong, vivid, fresh work; the real difficulty is that it530



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SIGNIFICANCE OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMYhas seen so little of such work, and has not as yet thought much aboutit. It has taken its art a good deal as though it were a lesson, to belearned and repeated; but when it does stop to think it is not goingto be afraid to express its opinion, and eventually it is going to cul-tivate that oare going to 73inion and make it worth expressing, and art conditionse affected by it. The real American public is so easilybrowbeaten, so absurdly good-natured, and after all art has seemedmore or less somethin extraneous, and so it has accepted didacticstatements and let ha it overcome any tendency to thought. Butonce the 1 ublic recognizes its capacity to think, to stimulate, to helpby thoug t its understanding and its appreciation of conditionswill astonish and gratify.But as to the actual exhibit.going must be unjust in s So general a criticism as the fore-arel;bound to be. ecific cases, as all general points of viewFor whi e you may object to certain tendencies andmethods of an institution, no institution which is supported by thepeople can continue to exist without some rare excellences. Specialexamples of exceptions to the rule at the present Academy werePaul CornoyersValle , Paul Hazy Morning,cl Mitts; Dou hertys

Charlotte Comans HappyThe White Tide, Hilda BelchersRe A W%arfbyi Johansen, Morni at Sunset, by Jerome Myers, Sea Baths,Hours,Funks 3 by Charles Curran, Wilhelmhast, %ortrait of himsel , Boats at Low Tide, by Edward Pott-Port, by E. W. Redfield; Horatio Walkers Wood Cut-ter and Ice Cutter, The Trembling Leaves, by Willard Met-calf, J. Alden Weirs symful paintings of children Eathetic portrait of a ovial old man, beauti-Cecelia Beaux an dEast Side, by Jacovelli, Howard Lydia Emmett,Thewife,

Cushings striking portrait of hisThe Mother, by J. Alexander, Tryons Sea Evening,A Winter Scene, by James Preston, and The Fair Penitent, byH. Watrous.The exhibition of sculpture, which was a art of the Academy,made a brave little showing at the Gould Ri &ng Academy, whichwas converted into a most charming semblance of a formal gardenfor this occasion.of distinctive It was a small exhibit, but an excellent showingwork, and arranged in the most satisfactory mannerof any sculptures exhibit that the writer can recall in this country.The smell of the fresh tanbark suing of the evergreens stimulated t%gested out-of-doors, and the mass-e imagination and roused interest.It was as though there might be many pathways leading to secludedbowers of romance. One permitted oneself to remember Schwetz-

ingen and Nymphenberg, where the sculpture and the gardens areso intimately related.531



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SIGNIFICANCE OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMYAgain one passed by the prize winners and searched for the moreintimate and personal ex ression,8, which was to be found in the bustof John La Earge by E th Woodman Burrou hs,

Chester Beach, Roths animals, Abastenia fithe children by

and Laura Eyres bas relief of Mary Ballard. berles little girls,Of the monumentalwork, the group of towerinTaft, shown and describe 3 significance was The Blind, by Loradoin THE CRAFTSMAN for A ril, 1908, aMaeterlinckian drama in plaster. The group of help ess sightlessones and the one seeinand hope! P child-what tragedy and appeal and sorrowFrench s A second arge piece of rare beauty was Daniel Chester Mourning Victory. For sheer s lendorB of line andexquisite grace in modeling, Mr. French has ut few equals eitherin this country or in Europe. So great is his gift of expression thathe awakens in one a sense of actual reverence for the technique ofhis art. And this gravely beautiful sorrowing Victory is one moreof his important achievements along these lines.To many who are faithfully and enthusiastically watching thedevelothan or ment of art in America, a greaterour painters appear to have strut Eroportion of our sculptorsnational interest. a definitely frank note ofIt is the rule, not the exception, with these artiststo manifest, whether consciously or unconsciously, a racial character-istic in their work, so that a small exhibit of American scul ture isapt to express a national feeling more vehemently than a muc Kcollection of American paintings would be likely to. largerAnd yet numerically our painters so far exceed our sculptors thatthe actual number of younger men who represent a strong vividimpression of our national quality is far greater among the paint-ers than sculptors. But when it comes to an exhibition of Amer-ican paintings the proportion of the academic men so far outweighsthe youn er school that the latter are more often than not snowedunder. wnd we are only just beto find them, and to proclaim t%inning to dig in the right directionem when we do find them. Andthis one thing we may not do too often-proclaim aloud and en-thusiastically the new vigorous growth in our art, in our aintingand sculpture alike, the indigenous growth so long withheld rom us,and so essential to our achievement as a nation.

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THE ABIDING LESSON OF GOTHIC ARCHI-TECTURE: ALL ITS BEAUTY AND INSPIRA-TION THE OUTGROWTH OF SOUND CON-STRUCTION: BY ERNEST A. BATCHELDERBy suffrage universal it was builtAs practised then, for all the country cameFrom far as Rouen, to give votes for God,Each vote a block of stone securely laidObedient to the masters deep mused plan.-Lowell.

T IS not the purpose of these articles to attem t any-thing in the nature of a history of Mediaeval in ustrial! art. Within the limits of the space available littlemore could be done than to set forth in dry, uninter-1 esting data the work of that period. There were1 many workers in many materials, widely se arated asdistances were necessarily computed in t ose daysof insecure and inadequate trans ortation, laboring in differentenvironments and under different in uences. There is an abundanceof literature on the subject of Medieval history, the life and customsof the time, the development of its institutions, its architecture andits industrial activities. From this material and from personal obser-vation and study it is the writers intention to choose certain examplesof work in stone, wood, iron, etc., and discuss them from a designpoint of view, how they were produced rather than why they wereproduced, and to tell the story in a way that may be of interest to thegeneral reader.Indeed, the question of how things were made, the study of con-structive problems and the conditions under which they were solved,may after all take one nearest to the true spirit of the work. We areapt to see the craftsman of the past as a light in a mist, a vague blurwithout personality. A philosophy of art fails to reach him ; a dis-cussion of abstract ideals leaves him as an unreal factor in the back-ground. We read into his work sentiments and emotions that wouldcause him to scratch his head in bewilderment if he were to hearthem,-for his work, like all true creative art, was not conceived as aconscious message to future generations ; it was merely an uncon-scious expression of immediate needs and convictions. It was aspontaneous development. The man at the bench did not stop toanalyze motives ; his interest was centered upon technical problems,how to secure a given result and meet definite conditions with thematerials, tools and processes at hand. To really ap reciate thebeauty of nature one must turn to others than the oets or an inter-i! Hpretation of what we find. And to understand t e spirit in which

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Medizeval industrial work waswrought we must push throughthe halo of romance and chiv-alry; through the abstract idealof the philosopher, eventhrough many of the aesthetic1 and sentimental motives thatlegend ascribes to the workers,and penetrate into the crooked nar-row streets of the old-world townwhere the pigs roamed at will. Thedescent is sudden; but it is neces-sary if we wish to visit the workersFIGURE ONE in their shops and watch them as theyhammer away at their trades quite

unconscious that their product, or such scraps of it as time hasspared, is to be reverently treasured under glass by a distant generation.

RELATION OF BEAUTY TO CONSTRUCTION

N W the life and the thought of the thirteenth century haveslip ed beyond recall into the past. We would not, if wecou d, revert to the conditions of that day, nor can we hoto coax beauty back into the world by adopting its industrial metho B es.That art was vital, as few arts have been, because it interpreted soforcefully and clearly the thoughts that had penetrated into the livesof the people. We cannot by any conscious effort of thought putourselves back into Mediawal times; that is to saout upon the world through the eyes of the MediEva 9 , we cannot lookpeople, see thingsas they saw and understood them. Little enough remains of theiractivities,- here a church, there the ruins of a castle, again a littlecluster of half-timbered houses huddled together in some bywaywhere the current of modern life has passed them, a few manuscriptsand utensils gathered into museums where we treasure them asriceless relics.E anty as are theremains, however,their art was sointimate1 relatedto their ives thatknowzzw gt; dressedand worked, howthey fought andplayed ; even theminute details of FIGURE TWO534



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FIOURE THREE

daily life are wrought instone and wood, iron andglass ; but when we thinkthat we are getting intoclose fellowship with theMediseval worker, whenhis personality is almostwithin reach, he suddenlyvanishes again. For inthe presence of his greatestachievement, the Gothic cathedral, he slips away into the back-ground, a vague figure, impersonal, more inexplainable than whenwe first began to make his ac uaintance.of the thouaht that penetratedP 8

Here is an expressioneepest into his life, and in its pres-ence we fee only a sense of our own littleness and insignificance.It thrusts its gray old towers and pinnacles from out of the MiddleAges above our own petty affairs, and we are almost willing toaccept the legends, the stories of wonderful miracles that clusterabout it. For we who order our churches ready made much as wedo our clothes and groceries, can never hope to understand the spiritthat moved men to ve of their time, money and labor to the con-struction of the flat edral, building it and rebuilding it on noblerand grander lines whenever fire or the wanton destruction of warrazed it to the ground. Of the old town then clustered about thechurch we know there were dark, noisome streets, unsafe and un-li hted at night,%ere plague andf

estilence 0 f t e nound a breedingplace, dingy housesand shops. Andyet from thesestreets, so strange-1t e church, camei at variance withthose who wroughtthese miracles instone, choosingone f rom theirnum-ber as masterbuilder, the rest

voluntarily givingto its construction



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RELATION OF BEAUTY TO CONSTRUCTIONa n d enrichmentthe best of theirlinear thou htsand efforts. grheFrench cathedralswere, in a peculiarsense, the result

p fgl-+rzgbuilders are knownto us, and thecountless crafts-

FIGuBELvDmen who laboredso industriously to give beauty to all the details of the fabric haveleft uo marks by which we may speak their names. It was allfor the glory of God, with an element of communal pride, a com-bination of religious fervor and popular enthusiasm.T US the cathedral seems as stable and enduring as the hillsor as the cliffs that rise from the sea. It appeals to our imagi-nation so strongly that we are loath to pry mto morequestions of ways and means. We would rather turn to t !Iracticale poetsfor an interpretation of why it was done than to those practical per-sons who have clambered over the edifice with rule and compass totell us how it was done. And yet, in the plain recital .of the meansadopted to maintain the stabilit2 of the structure is a storv of absorb-ing interest. We may then un erstand what a French whter of keeninsi%ht meant when he said that the Gothic cathedral wa.s more like amo ern engine than a building, in the sense that it was an activething, pushing, thrusting, filled with energy and reattention to keep it in working order. And we s%uiring unceasingall come closerto the builders when we examine the constructive problems thatconfronted them, problems that had never been solved before;when we study the conditions under which they worked in theirearnest efforts to give beauty to the structure that was rising undertheir hands. Here were simple stone masons and carpenters build-ing as experience taught them and clothing their work with an interestand beauty that were inevitable under conditions of true craftsman-ship. And they left behind them the last word in constructive skill,combining original thought and deep artistic feeling; but withal, a536



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FAFADE OF THE OOTHICCATHEDRAL AT AMIENS.

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CATHEDRAL OF ST.NICHOLAS, BLOIS. THE NORTH TOWWS OF THCATHEDRAL AT ORLltANS.

CATHEDRAL OF ST.ARMEL, PLMRMEL. DISTANT VIEW OF THECATHEDRAL AT CHARTRES.



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CATHEDRAL ROSACE AT LE MANS.THE ANCIENT TOWN OF CHARTRES,WITH VIEW OF CATHEDRAL.


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FLYING BUTTRESSES OFTHE COLOGNE CATHEDRAL.



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THE LOVELY WELL : A SMALL GOTHICSTRUCTURE AT NiiRNBERG.



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ANCIENT GOTHIC TOMB IN THE CATHE -DRAL OF ST. SRRALDS, NihNBERG.

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RELATION OF BEAUTY TO CONSTRUCTIONstructure in which every featureis organic in character and maybe traced back to its simple util-itarian origin.The building grew as a plantrows.f It was not all plannedeforehand on paper to the lastdetail, with mahce aforethou ht,like modern buildings. 4 hemaster builder lived on the workswhere he was able to take advan-tage of every unforeseen circum-stance that arose and apply newideas that came to him as thebuilding progressed. A largemeasure of the distinction thatattaches to the result is due to the shrewd com-mon sense and orderly thought of the mastermaker of churches and to the structural de-vices that necessity forced him to adout in orderto hold the building intact.A architectural s t y 1 e is very often spoken ofas if it were a question ofcolumns and capitals and mold-ings. There are many writerswho leave us with the im ression

that architecture and buil $ ing aretwo different things, telling usmuch about the orders andperiods, but little about themechanical problems and con-structive methods involved, as ifthese were of minor importance.If, for example, we compare theoutward aspects of the templesleft us by the Egyptian andGreek builders, many points yofdifference may be noted; likewisewe may have resemblances indetails and in the disposition ofthe ornament pointing to influ-

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RELATION OF BEAUTY TO CONSTRUCTIONences extending from one to the other.But there was little difference in theconstructive methods employed. On theother hand, there are constructive differ-ences between all of those buildings andthe churches left by the Mediaeval crafts-men, differences in the use of materialsand in the solution of mechanical prob-lems, that place the latter in a classapart, a new principle, a new thought.And we have no sufficient clue to the rad-ical differences in the ornamental stcrlesuntil we have studied closely the evel-opment of construction, for m each casethe ornament was a logical outcome ofthe structural rinci les employed.the Greek buil!lers tad discovered an!develo ed the neweven t ough they stlltyp of construction,remainedtheir ornament would have f; agans,un ergonea complete and inevitable change. In-cidentally, there is a grim, pathetic sortof humor in the effort that one finds hereand there of an architect of the Renais-sance struggling to redress a GothicCathedral in a conventional garb ofclassic ornament. It is difficult to be-_ -lieve that men could have so little understood the real points ofdifference. The result always looks, as some writer has put it, likethe dead branch of a tree suspended among the living branches.This last sentence describes in a few words the essential differ-ences . In all that preceded Gothic work the principle may be statedas dead, inert, inactive ; in Gothic work it may be called alive, active.Constructively, the oint may be illustrated by the simple pier andlintel, as shown in Kgure One. If a horizontal is placed upon twoverticals it is readily seen that there is nothing involved beyond thedownward weight of dead material. The uprights must be sufficient1stron P to support this weight. Of such character was a Gree %temp e with its wooden roof. But if an arch is built over the obetween the two uprights another problem must be faced, Feningor anarch exerts a horizontal thrust or pressure as well as a downward

weight. It brings to the problem the element of unrest. If the archis not securely braced or held in place it will spread outward, some-544



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RELATION OF BEAUTY TO CONSTRUCTIONwhat as indicated by the dotted line. The Romans held their archesand vaults intact by so building them that the thrust would alwaysbe overcome by a dead weight of material.N W in direct contrast to this inert principle is the method solargely employed by the builders of the North. In fact, itis so primitive and obvious in its idea that none but simple-minded stonecutters would ever have puzzled it out. Why not se-curely brace the thinP from the outside ? And so in doing that whichwas most simple and ogical, best adapted to the constructive problemsthat arose, they created a new style in architecture. Simple as theidea seems, however, it took many long years of atient work, manyexperiments, often disastrous, before it was pe$ ected; for it leadsto the activement of one tIi rinciple of construction, the nice1rust against another. A cathedra P calculated adjust-is no mere mass ofstone; it is a veritable organism, alive with energy, pushin , strainin 7 . Hold steady, one member says to another. If ou fai me we a 1o down toil ether;- i at as the builderssposed, t % and so, pushing this way and te fabric has been held intact for seven or gight hundredyears. The modern engineer can figure on paper exactly how it wasdone ; but those men worked it all out through dearly bought ex-perience in handling stone.couraging failures ; There were many experiments and dis-but they dared to try, and try again, until thewhole system stood complete. Applied to an arch the idea is ofcourse inadequate; it was only when churches were built throughoutwith stone that the develo ment of the outer bracin occurred. Andin the perfection of the i Bea, what do we find? If ssentially this :-A vast, immensely heavy, vaulted roof of stoneair uf on slender piers, the powerful side thrusts or oised high in thethe vaults caughton t e outside by flying buttresses and transmitted to other but-tresses with their feet securely braced at the ground. There is nouse for walls; the space from pier to pier is filled in with lass. Oneis amazed at the very thought of such a daring concePatience and brute stren$ h were sufficient to builB t oB a building.the temples ofEgypt; but here are men p ayinit IS interesting to trace some o P with the laws of gravitation. Surelythe steps in such develoPment.The earlier churches were built with wooden roo s over bothnave and aisles (Fi ure Two).difficulties ; their wa Is Constructively, they presented fewwere heavy with small windows above thelean-to roof of the aisle, with columns carseparate the nave from the aisles. The rst efforts of the buildersng longitudinal arches toto vault their roofs with stone were in the aisles where the vaults werecomparatively small and exerted very little pressure. But the pres-

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RELATION OF BEAUTY TO CONSTRUCTIONsure of a vault is steady and persistent; so the outer wall was strength-ened with a sim leE pilaster (Figure Three). In time this devel-oped into a real uttress of more pronounced form. Now the pointto be noted is that we may already tell from the exterior of the build-ing somethin of its interior construction, whether its roof is of stoneor of wood. 73 ut this, of course, is a long way from that system whichwe know as Gothic.IWAS when the builders sought to discard the wooden roof andvault the larger expanse of the nave that the complications began.It may be presumed that the step was taken primanly to give a moreenduring form to the buildin,, for we know that the wooden roofswere often destroyed by fire or in other ways.of the builders to grapple with this new The earl strugglesroblemii aff or sufficientmaterial for a book of intense interest. T ere are numerous waysin which a vault of stone may be constructed; but the subject is oneof too technical a nature to follow here. In their early efforts thebuilders threw strong supporting arches across the nave and builtvaults of the old Roman form between the arches. To stren thenthe walls against the arches on the outside, buttresses of the pi astertype indicated in Figure Three were built; but in later years thesewere found to be insufficient. The roofs threatened to fall andanother type of bracing had to be devised (Figure Six). Anotherexperiment is shown in Figure Four, one of the abbey churches atCaen. Here the walls are very heavy and the window openings are stillsmall. In this church one finds an af parent clumsiness in the work-manship, too; but these men were fee ing a way into new and unde-veloped principles. They had no reference library to turn to; nocollection of casts, photograThey were thrown upon ITIhs and picture post cards to help them.t eir own resources and inventive skill.The roof of the aisle was raised enough to enable them to constructa long half-barrel vault against the outer wall to transmit the thrustof the big nave vault across the aisle to the strona buttresses andthence to the ground. Time showed this to be another mistake, forthe vault over the aisle is too low to catch the full force of the pres-sure from above.But about this time necessity compelled these persevering workersto complete another important structural device without which, evento this point in fact, prostood that to build a vau t of stone, of the Roman type, a very eress would have ceased. It must be under-T n-sive and a complicated framework of wood is necessar

i. Furt er-

more the vault when cornpowerful side thrusts. B leted is very heavy and unwie dy, exertinggain, with Roman mortar the vault was546



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Eactically a solid when completed, and we know that the Mediaevaluilders had no such mortar; it may be that the secret was lost. Sothey attacked the problem in a different way and after many experi-ments devised a skeleton of stone ribs into which the roof proper wasfitted and upon which it rested. And with this new device in hand theyagain forged ahead to the perfection of their system. The advantageswere many, economically and structurally. It did away with muchof the expensiveof the vault and cpreliminary work in wood, strengthened the ribslvided the roof into sections so that a weakness inone part could be repaired without affecting the rest of the vault;it greatly diminished the outward pressure, and, perhaps most im-portant of all, the skeleton frame of ribs, by sustaining the weight ofthe vault, enabled the builders to distribute the weight and the thruststo definite points where they could deal with them in the most effectiveway (Figure Five).Now, after more than one roof fell in from insufficient externalsup ort, the next step was to frankly adopt the primitive idea notedin P igure One, push above the roof of the aisle and throw a flyingbuttress up a ainst the point where the pressure of the big vault was%trongest. T ere was no I: recedent for such a unique constructivedevice ; but it is ever a mar of genius to dare that which others hesi-tate to do because no one has ever done it before. They seemed togive no heed to the odd appearance that such a feature would in-evitablthe sta 35give to the exterior of their buildings; it was necessary forihty of the structure and that was reason enough for employ-ing it,-and therein is the abiding lesson of Gothic architecture ; thecraftsmen always accepted without reserve the clue that sound con-struction offered them, giving to each feature such beauty as theycould. In later years more sophisticated architects, hidebound tothe true style and the five orders, deplored all of the above asa relic of barbarism and diligently strove to hide their construction.Not so the Gothic builders; once established the flying buttress wasseized upon joyfully and given endless variations.On its first apthe roof itself (P earance it was treated much as if it were a part ofigure Six). Then the forms changed ; a pinnaclewas added,-for beauty ? Indeed no; for wei ht at a point whereweight was needed. Again they accepted the c ue and the pinnaclessprang upward into countless beautiful forms. The top of the but-tress was scooped out to conduct water from the main roof, and aspout naturally appeared to throw the water away from the buildingin order that ice might not form on the walls. This feature in turnbecame a source of joy to the stone carvers and was wrought intoall manner of fanciful gargoyles (Figures Seven and Eight).

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RELATION OF BEAUTY TO CONSTRUCTIONC NSTRUCTIVE logic developed another feature that is alwaysassociated with Gothic architecture,-the pointed arch. Its origin,at least with the Mediaeval builders, was not from any s&heticmotives ; clear-headed common sense brought it into general use.And here again it was a question of vaulting. ,4 round arch vault hasa very owe&l side thrust; and moreover it will be noted from FigureFive tRat it is unsuited for the vaulting of oblong areas. As theheight of a round arch is necessarily governed by its span, difficultiesare resented which are done away wrth when a pointed arch is used.1n t e intersection of two pointed vaults the heights can be adjustedat will regardless of their resform of opening then extende B ective spans. Once in use the pointedto the windows and doors of the church.With the pointed vault, the skeleton frame and the buttresssystem, the new constructive principle involved is apparent. It wasnot in those features alone, however, that the genius of the buildersappeared. In the same lo cal way the west front was developedfrom a bare wall with simp e doors and windows to the magnificentEortals of Rheims. The spires of Chartres, before which one feelske takina simple % a new grip on life, arose through many experiments fromelfry roof. And within the church, what one might callthe nervous system of the thing is so organic that a near-sighted manmay hasten to an examination of the base of a ier and know almostas much about the character of the structure a%ove as the rest of us.For every molding and rib of the huge skeleton is articulated throughthe piers. Indeed, the pier seems more like a bundle of withesbound together than a single piece of masonopenings were enlarged the glass workers fillex . And as the windowthe space from pier toler with that hopelessly beautiful wealth of color, most of which, alas!Eas been shattered and destroyed. With an assured construction thestone carvers multi lied; from bottom stone to topmost pinnacle theywrought with a ferti ity of invention and imagination that never ceasesto excite our wonder and admiration. In fact, there came a time whenthey were lost in the bewildering maze of their own fancies and stakedtheir skill against the material m which they worked; it seemed morelike lace on a delicate tracery of cobweb than stone. And thereincame the inevitable decline. For the very life and vitality of adesigners work ebbs away whenever he turns from constructiveproblems and endeavors to create beauty for its own sake.To other craftsmen, workers in wood, iron and other metals, thechurch sent forth a call for the best that mind and hand could do.In succeeding articles it is the intention to follow some of the activitiesof these other craftsmen from rude beginnings to those achievementsof wonderful beauty that in these prosaic days we treasure as priceless.548



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THE COST OF A GAME: A STORY: BY EVAMADDEN

UIDO loved Messer Leonardo more than anyone elsein the world, except Madonna Bianca, his mother.And as much as he loved -Messer Leonardo he hatedthe French. In those days he was just ten, big-eyed,with soft curls for hair and the rettiest, most eagerlittle face one can write about. 53 e loved to go intothe churches in his own great city, and there, amidthe many colors of painted windows, marbles, and splendid frescoes,to ray to the Saints, the Madonna and the little Bambino Jesus,to ll ess Messer Leonardo who had promised to teach him to be apainter, and to drive away the French and bring back Duke Lodovico.Now, Guido loved Messer Leonardo because, though he was thegreatest artist in all the world-and the world just then, too, inthe year fourteen hundred and ninety-nine, boasted more goodartists than it ever had b$fore or has since, for that matter-and knewt;za; Klay divinely on the lute, and how to build houses and planow to wnte books, to make statues and implements of war,and w& able, at least so Guido thought, to explain everything therewas in the world to ex lain, he was so kind that it was really betterto be with him than to it e with the other bo s, playing.He was handsome, too, tall and noble ooking, and he could tellsplendid stories, and there was a glow about him which warmed thesB irits as the sun does the earth and the flowers. And he gave chil-ren little presents, an orange to Beppo, a fig or two to Luigi, a toyto Romolo, and he was kind to every person and thing. When a docaught sight of him it almost smiled, certainly it wagged its tail an3ran toward his hand for petting. Horses erected their ears at the

sound of his step, and the poor birds imprisoned in cages bsellers knew that if Messer Leonardo, the Florentine, i the bird-c anced tocome their way he would buy every cage in sight, open the doors,and smile as he watched the rejoicin songsters fly heavenward.There were also manfirst being that all about L reasons w%y Guido hated the French,them, his father, Messer Niccold, his mother,Madonna Bianca, his Nonno, the neighbors, all of them, hated theFrench also. To begin with, they had come to Milan and had drivenaway Lodovico il Moro, the famous Duke who had done so much tomake the city splendid. With the help of Messer Leonardo, he hadconstructed a wonderful canal and drained the country; he hadwidened the narrow, dark, dirty, ill-smelling streets; he had beggedMesser Leonardo to plan a cupola for the reat cathedral, and he haderected statues and constructed noble bui dings.For these many reasons then, Guido-like all the Milanese, who,

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THE COST OF A GAMEpleased at first by French rule, had grown restless under Frenchoppression-hated the French. His special grievance against them,however, was that certain of their Gascon bowmen, for target practice,had made use of the model of Messer Leonardos great equestrianstatue of the Dukes father, Francesco Sforza, and bit by bit, an ear,a cheek, the nose, had shot away this work of genius. For fourteen%ears Messer Leonardo had labored upon it, and later, when theuke should have had the money, it was to have been cast in bronze.When the Dukes cousin, Bianca Sforza, had married the EmMaximilian and there had been festivities at Milan, the modeprorhadbeen erected in the piazza of the Caste110 for the people to gaze u on,wonder over, and make their boast even long after every scrap oP themodel had vanished.And then the French had come, and as they had shot MesserLeonardos sand so little 8 lendid work to ruins they had laughed and hurrahed,uido, who each day had gazed on the magnificent thing,hated them for their cruelty.When he thought of it all he clenched his little dim led fists andset his white teeth. He could never forget the look on K esser Leon-ardos face when he spoke of it. It was as sad as the one he worewhen he told Guido and the boys the sad fate of the little GoldenBoy of Milan.That was on an afternoon when Guido, running as fast as histen-year-old legs could carry him, joined some boys whom he hadpromised to meet and play with in a certain piazza, where there wasroom to run in, not far from where the old Caste110 lifted its graywalls and turrets against the very blue sky of Milan.He was late because he had stolen into a church and had kneltdown to say a little prayer to the Madonna and Bambino about hisbeing an artist. There in the dimness he had gazed from carving tostatue, from fresco to splendid tomb, and a great wish had filled hislittle heart to overflowing. Oh, if he, little Guido of Milan, couldone day add his own glorious pictures to these wonders!He was thinking of this as he ran toward the boys, already gath-ered in the piazza. They hailed him, eagerly.They were hot in talk against the French, some of whom hadbeen annoying the family of little Romolo.They drove away our Duke, our splendid il Moro !us badly here and we hate them! They rulecried Lorenzo, and he clenchedhis fists and stamped.

Si, sil cried clever-faced Giovanni, it was different whenLddovico was here ; my father says so.550



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THE COST OF A GAMEMy father says we had processions, put in Beppo, his handsjerking at his belt.Processions !The boys pricked up their ears.Above all else in the world Italians love processions.Sent? (which means listen), cried Guido, pushing into theconversation very eagerly, his brown eyesbobbing as he tossed back his little red-cappe f rowing big, his curlshead.I will tell you. Listen, boys;Even grave Giovanni smiled.Oh, they were sPlendid,

They all loved to listen to Guido.clear little voice thril in those processions, he began, his highardo planned them. 6 , they were mance he made al knificent, for Messer Leon-F rudzso

the planets and stars ofEste. and they sang a song in praise of our Duchess Beatriceidea. And he planned a bird with wings. And he had a greatListen, it was to bring down the snow from the Alps and makeit fall in our piazza in summer !Leonardo ! He knows everything, does MesserMore, Guido mio, more! cried the boys, and they pulled thelittle fellow to the steps of a church.We can sit here and listen! cried Giovanni, but first they allbowed to the statue of the Madonna and Bambino.Guido thrust back his little cap and began eagerly to describeall the glories of the days which had vanished with the flight of il Moro.And our Duke, he went on in his sweet bo sh voice, lovedour Duchess more than. all else in the world, an% to please her heonce made her, oh, the most wonderful festal It was New Yearand there were two thousand peo

such a sight as their silks and broca ile invited, and there never wases and jewels and laces. MesserLeonardo planned all the dishes for the table, and each one wasmolded in a form to tell a story. But the sout his hands ; it was called the Age of prectacle! Guido spreadold and it showed thepeople what our Duke had done for Milan.It was the Age of Gold then, put in Giovanni, hitching at hislittle crimson tunic. Everybody had plenty then, fine clothes, andfood and all you wanted, but now-He s read out his hands and shrugged his shoulders in disgust.An$ if our Duke had remained went on Guido very earnestlyMesser Leonardo would have invented wings, do you know that:boys? But now- and he, too, spread out his hands andshru ged his little shoulders just as Giovanni had done, only his

han % were dimpled and still babylike, while Giovannis were longand thin and slender.55



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THE COST OF A GAMEIf Messer Leonardo had made wings, said Guido, very wisely,we could fly over the mountains to Rome to the Pope and ask himto come and drive away the French. And, oh, boys, and his eyes

flashed, if we had wings we could fly over the ocean to a strange newland which Messer Cristoforo Colombo of Genoa has just discovered!Messer Leonardo knows all about that also, and the men and womenthere are red, and the rivers are full of gold. Oh, how splendidit would be to fly! Si, si,p9 erred the boys, and with a sudden rush they jumpeddown from the steps and ran about the street flappin their arms andleaping upward to see how it would feel to fly. When their breathwas gone they came back to the steps and Guido.Our Duke believed in Messer Leonardo, announced Guido,as proudly as if he owned the artist, Senti, boys, I will tell P ou some-thing very im ortant.!f Messer Leonardo would have ound thePhilosophers tone if the Duke hadnt been driven from Italy, andthen everything he touched would have turned to gold.We dont believe it, said the boys, and one or two hooted.But Guido ersisted.YlThe Frenc have ruined everything, he cried, Vim i l M ore!and he waved his little cap.Viva i l Moral Down with the French! cried the boys, andthey did not notice the black look which passed over the face of oneof that race who at that moment came out of the church and heardthem.He was a

up their fists soldier, and as he went his way, the little boys doubledand shook them at his back, their dark little Italianfices scowling.But the spectacle, dear Guido,plucked at Guidos sleeve. and little Luigi, who loved stories, Si! si, and he smiled at the little fellow. He was almost ababy, little Luigi, and Guido felt like a man beside him. Therewas a chariot and unicorns to draw it, and on it was a great globe toreto oro Colombo has sailed to India.resent the world. It is round now, you know, since Messer Cris-The boys gazed at Guido inadmiration. He seemed to know everything, he learned so much fromMesser Leonardo. And on this globe, he continued, wasstretched a warrior in a cuirass of rusty iron. He, explained Guido,wisely, was the A e of Iron which was gone. From out his breastspranI! a tiny little %oy holding a branch of mulberry- or our Duke, put in Lorenzo, and the bo s nodded, all know-ing that il More meant the mulberry, the em i lem of their DukeLodovico.552



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THE COST OF A GALMEAnd this little boy,who was all continued Guido with great importance,waved his han f ilded over his body until he was a golden barn&no,and sang:

The A e of Gold shall brighten as of yore,And al exulting sing: Long live the Moor ! Viva i l Moral cried the boys, tell the rest, the rest! Guido, whispered little Lui igB

Pof old and ride in a procession! 1 would like to be a little boyut Guido had sprung from the ste8 s, Messer Leonardo! he cried, his face all aglow.esser Leonardo ! Up the street was coming a tall, very handsome man, in a rose-colored cloak and flat Florentine cap. As he drew near, the boyscould see the radiance which seemed to glow in the fine intellectualface whose frame was the splendor of long, fine, soft hair and flowingbeard, and whose ecl eslife with a clear un seemed to be gazing into all the mysteries oferstanding.When he saw his friends, the boys, his face broke into smiles,and every trace of sadness vanished in the briure. He held out his hand for Guidos. rl ht warmth of his pleas-it close, and Messer Leonardo smiled. he little fellow claspedWith the other he encircledLui ,8 and the boys clustered round.nly Piero slunk back.pered: Plucking at Giovannis tunic, he whis- ECCO,dear Giovanni, but my mother says Messer Leonardo hasthe Evil Eye, and he made a sign of horns with two fingers, as theItalians do to this day when the fear evil.The other boys paid no heeB , but drew Messer Leonardo to theste s and Guido, in the pretty fearless way some enchanting littlechi dren have even with people as famous as Messer Leonardo,begr d him to finish the story.nd while they listened, he described to them the splendor of theCastello, of the guests in the fine raiment, the beauty of the DuchessBeatrice, and all theAnd the little %lory of the car of the Age of Gold.Guide. oy, Messer Leonardo, tell that, whisperedIt was then that Messer Leonardos face had grown sad and hiseyes had seemed to glisten.He was such a pretty little fellow, he said, and such a baby!I entreated them not to do it, but the mother was dead, and thefather, a poor tinker, sold him for gold, sold his own little bo forf

old, thou h they told him what must happen. It is so wittalians. 8

ll usold, gold, all for 7old !It was a pretty sight to see the Sold his baby for a few acudi.ittle golden fellow riding on the world

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THE COST OF A GAMEand waving his branch and crying, V iva i l M oral and I think,my little Luigi, that manplace that day, and were I little boys of Milan wished to be in hislled with envy when they saw the sunlightsparkling on the olden bumbino.And Messer L onardo patted Luigis cheeks, which suddenlygrew very red, as his eyes drooped.But when the festu was over the fineGold entirely. r ople forgot the Boy ofI went to him, for I knew w at was to happen.Then Messer Leonardo explained to the boys all about the work-ings of the human body and told them how thethe pores of the little fellows skin with their go1 had stopand for t1 ed up alleir splen-dors sake, wicked men that they were, they had killed him, the prettymotherless little baby.He suffered much, and he cried for his mother, poor littleone, and Messer Leonardo rose to go his way.Guidos hand, and he kept it fast in his. He had been holdingCome with me, little one, he said, I have something to showyou.Then he turned to the boys.He will return to you later, he promised.As they made their way through the streets, Guido holding hishand and prattling away of the time when he, too, should be a greatartist, now and then some woman standing in a shop door, or hangiout from some window, would make the sign of the horns or draw ba2and cross herself. Sometimes a man would suddenly swerve&asideand take to the other side of the street.He is a wizard, that Leonardo da Vinci, the Florentine, wasthe whisper which long had passed in and about Milan.

When Messer Leonardo chanced to see such a man or womana look of pain would, for a moment, pass like a cloud across the radi-ance of his face. Then his eyes would grow clear, his mouth smileagain, and he would pass along his way as if nothing could ever dis-turb him.After a short walk, he and Guido came to the church of SantaMaria delle Grazie.It was here, dear little Guido, said Messer Leonardo vesadly, that our Lady Beatrice came on the evening before she die7 .Nothing has ever gone right since that day in Milan. She was thegood angel of our Duke and when she went to purudiso, the otherplace began in our Milan.As he talked he led little Guido through the door of the monasterythere by the church and into a long narrow room where the monkstook their meals.554



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THE COST OF A GAMEGuido knew then what he was to see. Messer Leonardo longago had promised him.For a moment he closed his eHe was only a little child wE

es, then he opened them.

iiartakeno had not yet been confirmed or

oliness of the Holy Communion, but he could not speak for theof his awe.On the wall he saw the picture of Our Lord and at the table withHim were His Disciples.That was all, but today that same picture, broken, faded, old,restored, has a power possessed by none before nor after.And as they did eat,that little Guido mi quoted Messer Leonardo, very softly,represented, He sai3ht understand just what moment the picture,betray me. Verily, I sa unto you that one of you shallAnd they were excee d!lng sorrowful, and began everyone of them to say unto Him, Lord, is it I ? Then he changed his tone.It is my Cenacolo, little Guido, my Last Supper. Little Guido knew them all, There was St. John whom Jesusloved, St. Peter and St. Andrew, his brother and- Oh, Messer Leonardo, there is Judas! and he shrank awayfrom the face which had so long baffled the brush of Messer Leonardoand delayed the picture.Messer Leonardo gazed lonGuidos hand. Into that fresco 5 at his Cenacolo, still holdinge had put the labor of two wearyyears, and into it, too, he had put his dreams, his genius, his hope forimmortality as an artist, always while he painted it being pulledaway by his desire to be about any one or all of the manv things whichalso interested him: his mathematics, his science, hi\ sculpturing,all the talents which so fought to possess him that they never let himbecome the slave of any one of them lonber of all the hundreds of things he was a ways planning, commencingenough to finish any num-and deserting.As for Guido, his little heart seemed bursting, for his mother, andMesser Leonardo, too, had taught him to love the Lord Jesus andall the Saints. And here they were alive before him, and his babyeyes, without understandin ,suffering to be; saw all the s% saw all the prophecy of the ain andadow of the Great Tra !i 1dy of t e Lamband the Traitor; his little heart felt all the awe of t at Holy Supr r,and with it he realized, too, all the homeliness and familiar loo ofsome men, like his own Babbo and Nonno, sitting down to a table withtheir friend. And as hefore in all his little life fe t such sorrow.

azed, it seemed to him that he had never be-Perhaps Messer Leonardounderstood this, knowing what a sensitive little soul his was, forkhe

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THE COST OF A GAMEled him from the solemn room out into the bright sunlight of the after-noon.Run away now, my Guido, he said, and play.

But Guido pulled at his hand. Messer Leonardo, he begged, you will teach me as you doyour pupils, as you do Salai ? Messer Leonardo nodded.When you are older, my Guido, he answered with a smile.Guido ran as fast as he could, for he knew the boys were waiting.His little brain was full of his future and he was lannini % oh, such apicture, his mother for the Madonna, little Alfre o for t e Bambino,when, with merry shouts, the boys rushed to meet him. We have a fine game! they cried. Listen, Guido, listen!We are the French, announced one half.We are the Milanese, cried the other.You are the Duke, Guido, and Giovanni set him apart. Andhere is Milan, see, and he indicated a place on the stone paving.Now, see, we will besiege you, Milan will fall, you will be drivenoff and then later, with brave troo s you will return and Milan willdrive awa the French.il More! % Come, te Y Vivaivu! us, isnt that a fine game?Down with the French! yelled the boys.It was a very innocent game. Little boysbut end it, part friends, run home and forget aiflay the same today,out it; but not theselittle Milanese children who, shoutidreamed the price Milan, Messer ?

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