Of course every one selects some one picture or statue which impresses him to the point of carrying away a memory thereof. We had among us a young American physician who stood in the orthodox pose before the Gladiator. Having studied anatomy, muscles and things of that nature were just in his way. He stood for full twenty minutes wrapped in what he desired us to understand as ecstacy, and then delivered himself thus:—
“A——! This is the very actuality of the ideality of individuality.”
It was a very pretty speech, and the fact that he had lain awake all the night before arranging it, and that he pulled us all around to the Gladiator to get his chance of firing it off did not detract from its merit. No one knew what it meant, but the words were mouth filling, and it did as well as though it had some glimmer of meaning. There is nothing in art like good sounding words.
From the ground-floor you ascend a broad stair-case, exquisitely carved. You come into another wilderness, only this is in canvas, instead of marble. Every school in the world is represented here, for when the French potentate was not able to buy he could always sieze. You don’t stop to inquire how the collection was made; it is here, and to an American, or any other foreigner, that is sufficient. We come to enjoy the pictures, and we don’t care whether they were purchased or taken by force. There are, as I said, one hundred and forty of these salons, and you must go through them all. There are galleries devoted to the French school, ancient and modern, the Italian school, the German, Dutch, Flemish, and Spanish, and you come away feeling a sort of satisfaction that it has been done; but no man living, in the time one usually has in Paris, can get a good idea of what is there gathered. Four miles of art is rather too much for one short effort. It is bewildering in its very profusion. One may be fond of art, but not educated to the point of taking so much of it in systematically. Nevertheless, days spent in collections like the Louvre are too good to miss. Some of it will stick to you if you cannot carry it all away.
TIBBITTS AND THE FARO BANKERESS ENJOYING ART.