ESQUIMAUX. PLAINS INDIAN. SAMOYEDE.
The Portico Busts.—The list of the men commemorated by the nine busts in the portico is as follows: Demosthenes, Emerson, Irving, Goethe, Franklin, Macaulay, Hawthorne, Scott, and Dante. The Demosthenes, Scott, and Dante were modelled by Mr. Herbert Adams; the Emerson, Irving, and Hawthorne by Mr. J. Scott Hartley; and the Goethe, Franklin, and Macaulay by Mr. F. Wellington Ruckstuhl. The reader will see that so far as possible with an odd number, the work of each sculptor is, so to say, in balance—Mr. Ruckstuhl’s in the centre, flanked by Mr. Hartley’s, and Mr. Adams’s at either end—thus avoiding any possible confusion of style, and giving the artist all the advantage which comes from a symmetrical disposition of his productions. There is, as a matter of fact, very little diversity in the present series. Each bust is of uniform height—about three feet, not reckoning the pedestal—with a uniform background. The statue of Franklin, coming in the centre, has, intentionally, a certain effect of pre-eminence. The sculptor conceived him “as one of the greatest men of this country, and as a writer and philosopher the patriarch, and therefore aimed to make him dominate the rest.” A word should be said regarding the background of the busts—the glass enclosed in the framing of the circular windows. The effect, as always of a window, is dark, as granite would not have been, thus throwing the busts, which are of the same material as the walls, into sharp, strong relief.
COREAN. JAPANESE. AINO.
BURMESE. THIBETAN. CHINESE.
Mr. Pratt’s Spandrel Figures.—The beautiful spandrel figures of the Entrance Porch modelled by Mr. Bela L. Pratt are six in number.[4] All are about life-size, and are shown leaning gracefully against the curve of the arches. After what has been said of the intractability of granite as a medium for any but the bolder sorts of sculpture, it is not out of place to call attention to the exceptional delicacy and refinement with which these figures have been chiselled. They represent, as has been said, Literature (the left hand arch), Science (in the centre), and Art (to the right). In the background of each spandrel the sculptor has introduced a branch of walnut, oak, laurel, or maple leaves. Of the figures themselves, the two to the left stand respectively for the contemplative and the productive sides of Literature—reflection and composition. The one is writing upon a tablet, although for a moment she turns aside as if in search of the fitting phrase; while the other, at the right, with a hood over her head and a book held idly in her hand, gazes out dreamily into the distance. Of the figures of Science, the first holds the torch of knowledge, and the second, with the celestial globe encircled by the signs of the zodiac in her arm, looks upward, as if to observe the courses of the stars. Here, also, it will be seen that something of the same distinction as in the first arch is drawn between the abstract and the practical. In the third group, the figure to the left represents Sculpture, and that to the right, Painting. The latter busies herself with the palette and brush. Sculpture, with a mallet in her hand, is studying a block of marble in which she has already blocked out the head and features of a bust—that of the poet Dante.
THE MAIN ENTRANCE.
The three deep arches of the Entrance Porch terminate with three massive bronze doors, covered with a design of rich sculptural ornament in relief. Each is fourteen feet high to the top of the arch, with an extreme width, including the framing, of seven and a half feet, and a total weight of about three and a half tons. The subject of the decoration is, in the central door, The Art of Printing, modelled by Mr. Frederick Macmonnies; in the door to the left, Tradition, by the late Olin L. Warner; and to the right, Writing, begun by Mr. Warner, but left unfinished at his death (in August, 1896), and completed by Mr. Herbert Adams. The three thus indicate in a regular series—the sequence of which, of course, is Tradition, Writing, and Printing—the successive and gradually more perfect ways in which mankind has preserved its religion, history, literature, and science. Each of the doors is double, with a tympanum at the top closing the arch. The various portions of the design are comprised in a high and rather narrow panel in each leaf, with small panels above and below, and finally the large semicircular panel occupying the tympanum above.