The Communists ruined many of the finest works in the lower part of the building, but fortunately their ravages were confined to a small space. More important matters occupied their attention, and the Louvre was virtually spared. It was set on fire, however, and the magnificent library of ninety thousand volumes was entirely destroyed, and many works of art were injured, but the troops of the Republic arrived in time to arrest the progress of the flames, and the building was preserved.
The first floor of the building is devoted wholly to ancient sculpture, and a wilderness there is of it. Too much of it, in fact, unless one has time for its study. You stop a moment to admire a Psyche; you have only time to glance at the Caryatides in the hall in which Henri IV. celebrated his marriage with Margaret of Valois; you pass through the Salle du Gladiateur, containing the Borghese Gladiator, the famous work made familiar through copies of it; you look down a long hall filled with wonderful statues and see at the farther end the outline of a figure whose very pose is a poem. The room is hung in crimson velvet, and the light, soft and subdued, makes the figure seem almost that of a living, breathing being. At this distance the effect is wonderful. There was great genius in making the sculpture; there was almost as much in placing it.
There is a long vista of beautiful statues lining the way on either side to the crimson chamber, which, with its gentle lights and shades, makes the picture perfect, and as one feels the delight of the scene wonder ceases at the ravings of artists and lovers of art over the Venus of Milo.
There, in the center of the crimson room, stands the armless figure whose perfection of form and face has never been equaled. It stands alone, with nothing near to distract the mind by divided attention, and as the lover of the beautiful looks upon the wondrous beauty of that speechless yet speaking statue, admiration ripens into adoration.
Even Tibbitts and the faro bankeress stood still and silent before it for full twenty minutes, and no greater compliment was ever paid a work of art. It interested even them.
The figure compels feeling. You do not feel that you are enjoying rare sculpture, but your sympathies go out to the beautiful form before you, not in cold marble but in life—real life, with all the tender qualities belonging in nature to such a perfect face and figure.
This may be gush, but there is something about this block of marble that is fascinating beyond expression. In it art has conquered material. The marble lives and breathes. It is marble, but it is marble endowed with life. Or, rather it is not marble, it is life resembling marble. It is a dream caught and materialized. If it is not nature, it is more than nature. It is a poet’s idea of what nature should be.
A VERY PRETTY ART SPEECH.
Whether it be the face with the wonderful features that almost speak, or the form so graceful in pose, or the combination of both, cannot be said; but the effect is produced, and no one can withstand the silent appeal made by this creation of an unequaled genius. It is something of which one cannot tire. The oftener it is seen the greater the impression. It can never be forgotten, nor can it be described. It cannot be reproduced, either in marble or oil. There are innumerable copies of it the world over, but to feel and realize the absolute perfection of the work the original must be seen. No copy can do it justice.
The great trouble with the Louvre is there is too much of it. If one could live to the age of Methusaleh it would all be very well, but unfortunately life is short. You wish you had not so much to see, for you want to see it all, and the very wealth is bewildering. Recollection becomes confusing and mixed.