AT THE METROPOLITAN
Dicky, the Honorary Member of the United Service Club, had been
considered too young to become a member of the party to visit the
Metropolitan Museum. He had, however, begged so hard not to be left
behind, that Helen and Roger had relented, and had promised to take him
if he, in his turn, would agree not to bother Miss Graham by asking more
than a million questions every ten minutes. He was also under bond not to
stray away from the party.
As it turned out, however, the Honorary Member did not go to New York on
the appointed day. He had planned an expedition of his own for purposes
of investigation, and the results were such that he was not able to meet
his other engagement later on.
Underneath his bobbed hair Dicky kept a sharp pair of ears and there was
very little of the talk about his aunt's new house that had escaped his
attention. Among other things he had listened while his sisters and
cousins had commented upon the manner in which the kitchen was equipped.
The floor was concrete, the walls were of white tile, the shelves were of
glass, and the cupboard doors of enameled metal.
He had heard his mother say to his Aunt Louise: "Why, you could turn the
hose on it to clean it, couldn't you?"
The idea had inflamed his imagination and he determined to see how it
would work. Detaching the hose and spray from the bath-room he trotted
off immediately after breakfast, intent on putting into effect his
mother's idea. It seemed to him that it would be a delight to live in a
house where one might enter into the kitchen at any moment and find the
cook spraying the walls with a hose. If the reality proved to be as
charming as the anticipation, he was going to beg his mother to have
their own kitchen made over promptly.
The workmen were all upstairs at Sweetbrier Lodge but the lower doors
were open so that there was no difficulty in achieving an entrance. He
knew how to attach the spray to the faucet and a twist of the fingers
turned on the water.
It seemed to him as the first dash struck him full in the face, he having
been a little careless about the nozzle, that his Aunt Louise need not
have worried about the pressure of the town water. He shook his head like
a pussy cat in the rain, but manfully restrained the ejaculation that
leaped to his lips. He was glad that he did, because nobody interrupted
and the succeeding moments were filled with ecstasy. He sprayed the
floor, the electric range, the shiny white table, the glistening
cupboards, and, best of all, the gleaming tiles of the walls down which
the drops chased each other in a joyous race for the floor.
The moments sped in this entrancing pursuit.
At home a cry for Dicky had arisen as the time came to dress him for his
trip to New York. Nobody knew where he had gone. It was not until Ethel
Brown telephoned to Dorothy that they learned that he had been seen
passing her house.
"He must have gone to Sweetbrier Lodge for some reason or other," said
Ethel Brown. "What on earth possessed him on this morning of all
mornings!"
She called to Roger, and he dashed off on the run to see if he could find
his wandering brother. None of the workmen at the new house had any
knowledge of his whereabouts, and it was not until Roger opened one of
the carefully closed doors and was greeted by a dash of water, straight
in his waistcoat, that he found the wanderer.
Roger was a boy of even temper but he confessed to his mother afterwards
that his fingers ached as never before to impress on Dicky his
disapproval of his occupation.
"What on earth are you doing here?" he demanded, snatching the hose from
Dicky's reluctant fingers, and turning off the water.
"Washing down the walls," replied Dicky truthfully.
"Incidentally you've given yourself a good soaking," said Roger, looking
at the thoroughly drenched little figure before him. "Here, slip into
this coat, and I hope I haven't got to carry you home the whole way, you
big, heavy creature."
"I think I'd be warmer if I trotted myself," suggested Dicky, a little
apprehensive of what might happen to him in the way of a bear hug, in his
brother's strong arms.
"I guess you're right," said Roger. "We'll have to run like deer, for
it's almost time for the car to come for us. This puts an end to your
going into town, I suppose you understand, young man."
Dicky had not thought of losing his other joy while he was realizing his
first delight, and he puckered his face for a howl, but before the sound
could come out, Roger said: "You brought it on to yourself, so don't
yell. This is the natural result of what you've been doing. You can't
expect ten people to wait for you to be thoroughly dried and got ready to
go into town, can you?"
Dicky was an uncommonly reasonable child and he swallowed his sobs as he
shook his head. There was no farther conversation, for both boys were
running as fast as Roger's legs could set the pace. Dicky's strides were
assisted by his brother, who seized his arm and helped him over the
ground with giant steps.
Mrs. Morton's view of the situation seemed to be painfully like Roger's,
and Dicky found himself put into the care of Mary and an unnaturally
rough bath towel, his only part in the expedition that had promised such
happiness to him, being the sight of his relatives climbing into his
grandfather's automobile and dashing off toward Glen Point, where they
were to pick up Miss Graham and the Hancocks.
When the party reached New York they made up their minds that they might
as well approach the Museum containing many beautiful objects by the
prettiest way possible, so at 59th Street the car swept into Central
Park. As they entered, Miss Graham called their attention to the golden
statue of General Sherman, made by the famous sculptor, Saint-Gaudens. As
they neared the Museum, she pointed out Cleopatra's needle, an Egyptian
shaft covered with hieroglyphics.
"The poor old stone has had a hard time in this climate," said Roger. "It
has scaled off terribly, hasn't it?"
"They are trying to preserve it by a preparation of parafine," said Miss
Graham.
"I should think it would have to be repeated every winter," said Helen.
"It doesn't seem as if parafine was much of a protection against heavy
frost."
Just inside the entrance of the building they found Della and Tom
awaiting them. Miss Graham called their attention first to the tapestries
hanging in the entrance hall, and told them something of the patient work
that went into the production of one of these great sheets of painstaking
embroidery.
"Are they making them anywhere, nowadays?" asked Ethel Blue.
"When the war is over and you go to Paris, you can see the tapestry
workers in the Gobelins factory," said Miss Daisy. "Every machine has
hung upon it the picture which the worker is copying. It may take a man
six or seven years to complete one piece."
"Shouldn't you think he would be sick to death of it!" exclaimed Dorothy.
"I suppose the first year he tells himself he must be pleasant, so that
he will see the picture get started. In the second year perhaps he'll be
ready to put in the feet of his figures. Then all the middle years must
be comparatively exciting because he's doing the central part of the
picture; and the last year he has a sort of a thrill because it's almost
done, even though the work may be all in the clouds."
"I judge that they make landscapes with figures, chiefly," guessed James.
"Many of them are landscapes with figures," replied Miss Daisy. "They
have a wide variety of objects. The factory belongs to the government and
the pieces are used as decorations for government buildings, and as gifts
to people of other countries. The French Government gave Miss Alice
Roosevelt a piece of Gobelin when she was married. I've seen it on
exhibition in the Art Museum at Cincinnati."
"I suppose all the workmen now have gone to the war, and the factory is
closed," said Tom.
"Probably. The men who work there now are descendants, sometimes in the
third or fourth generation, of the early workers. They hold their
positions for life and although their pay is not large they also have
each a cottage and piece of land on the grounds of the factory."
As the U. S. C. ascended the great stair-way they passed numerous
impressive busts and stopped to look at all of them. Most of the men were
famous Americans, whose names were already familiar to the young people.
"Now," said Miss Graham, as they reached the head of the stairs, "later
on we can choose the kind of thing we would like especially to see, but
first I want to show you two or three pictures and we can talk a little
about them. Then perhaps we will enjoy better the pictures we see
afterwards."
"I am sure we shall," answered Roger, politely, although his heart was
yearning for the Riggs collection of armor.
Miss Daisy read his mind.
"I know you want to see the Riggs armor most of all," she said, "and
Margaret and James have been talking a lot about the Morgan collection
and the Ethels told me on the way in that they had seen in the Sunday
papers reproductions of some of the pictures in the Altman collections
and they want to see the originals. We can see all those later on, but
first we will look for a minute at a very famous picture by a
Frenchwoman, Rosa Bonheur."
"Oh, I remember about her," said Helen. "She used to wear men's clothes
when she was working in her studio. She said skirts bothered her."
"I should think they would," said James. "I remember about her, too. She
made a specialty of animals and sometimes she had lions and other wild
animals from some Zoo, and let them wander about. She needed to be
dressed so she could skip lively if they made any demonstration!"
"Those are huge horses, aren't they," said Ethel Blue, as they stood
before the "Horse Fair."
"They look as if they were 'feeling gayly,' as the North Carolina
mountaineers say," quoted Dorothy.
"What is it all about?" asked Miss Graham.
"Why, I don't know," answered Ethel Blue slowly. "Is it about anything in
particular? Isn't it just a lot of horses being taken to a Horse Fair for
exhibition?"
Miss Graham nodded and said that that was probably all there was to it.
Then she led them to a picture by a French artist, Meissonier.
"I spot Napoleon," said Tom promptly, as they took up their position.
"This is called 'Friedland, 1807,'" said Miss Graham.
Before she could ask any question or make any suggestion about the
picture, Helen had explained "Friedland."
"That was one of Napoleon's famous battles. Here he defeated the Russians
and Prussians."
"Eighteen hundred and seven?" repeated James. "Why, Napoleon was at the
very height of his power then, wasn't he?"
"He looks it," said Margaret. "Doesn't he look as if he were the lord of
the world? And how those men around him gaze at him with adoration! He
certainly had a wonderful ability for making himself beloved by his
soldiers!"
Miss Graham had been listening to these comments with the greatest
interest.
"What difference do you see between this picture and the 'Horse Fair'?"
she asked.
They looked carefully at the picture before them and Ethel Blue scampered
back to refresh her memory on the "Horse Fair."
"There isn't any more action in one than the other," said James, "though,
of course, it's different."
"But this one makes me think a lot about a great man," added his sister.
"And you want to know what it's all about," exclaimed Ethel Brown.
"You feel as if there must be some story about this one," said Ethel
Blue, returning from her expedition to the "Horse Fair."
"That's just the point," said Miss Graham, patting her shoulder, "There's
no especial appeal to the imagination in the 'Horse Fair.' You just see
horses going to any horse fair in northern France, and there's nothing to
tell you that one horse has won a ploughing match and that another is a
candidate for a blue ribbon because of his great weight. But here you
realize at once that Napoleon was a man to command attention. You want to
know what he has been doing. You feel that there is some good reason for
the evident admiration of his soldiers. Those two pictures are examples
of two different classes of pictures. The 'Horse Fair' you might call a
sketch in a traveller's note book. The Napoleon picture is an
illustration in a story."
The young people thought over all this and nodded their agreement.
"Now come with me and see this picture of a pretty girl."
Miss Graham led the way to the Morgan collection and they looked into the
winning face of "Miss Farren." She seemed to be moving swiftly across the
canvas, her dress and cloak streaming behind her from the speed of her
motion.
"She's a pretty girl," said Roger, with his hand on his heart. Tom nodded
in agreement, but James shook his head.
"She looks silly," he said sternly.
"There isn't any story to her picture, I'm sure," said Helen. "That's
just a portrait."
"But may not a portrait indicate something of the character of the
sitter?" asked Miss Graham.
"It ought to," returned Margaret, "and I should think there was something
of this girl's character in the portrait, but there's nothing to show
that this might be the illustration of a story."
"Unless it were the frontispiece, showing the picture of the heroine,"
said Roger.
"But the heroine doing nothing that is told about in the story," insisted
Helen.
Miss Graham made no comment on these criticisms but led the way to
another picture, also of a girl, but this time of a girl in the dress of
a peasant and not handsomely arrayed as was Miss Farren.
"There is a bigger difference than clothes between these two," said
Della, "but I don't know just what it is. This girl isn't pretty like
Miss Farren."
"Do you know who this is?" asked Miss Daisy.
"Somebody who is thinking a lot," said Ethel Brown.
"She is seeing things in her mind," said Ethel Blue.
"Who is the most famous girl in history, who did that?" asked Miss
Graham.
"Jeanne d'Arc," said Helen. "She saw visions that inspired her to be a
leader of men in the army and she brought about the coronation of her
king when he was kept from his throne by the English who held Paris and a
large part of France."
"She is seeing visions now," whispered Ethel Blue, clinging to Miss
Graham's arm.
Miss Graham gently smoothed the fingers that were tensely closed over the
sleeve of her jacket.
"Why do you suppose Helen told us about Jeanne d'Arc just now?" she
asked.
"Because Helen just naturally knows all the history there is to be
known," said Roger, joking his sister in brotherly fashion.
Helen flushed and murmured something that sounded like, "I thought you'd
like to know why she looked like that."
"There is something more than just her character and her disposition in
that picture," said Margaret.
"If a single picture can be a story picture, I should think this was a
story picture as much as the Napoleon one," said Tom.
Again Miss Daisy nodded her approval.
"I call it a story picture," she said. "Helen felt that it was,
immediately, and that is why she told us something of the story of Jeanne
d'Arc."
"Most landscapes must be just note book pictures, then," guessed Ethel
Brown.
"Unless the landscape should be a background for some story," said Della.
"There might be gypsies kidnapping a child, for instance."
"Of course there are other divisions," said Miss Graham, "but roughly
speaking, almost every picture is either a record of fact or of
imagination, or else it tells a story."
"It's going to be interesting to think about that, when we look at the
other pictures we shall see later on," said Tom, and even Roger nodded
assent, although his heart was still set upon the armor.
"Now, let's go back for a moment to look at the 'Horse Fair,'" said Miss
Graham. "What do you think a picture ought to have in it to be a real
picture?" she asked as they went along the gallery.
"It seems to me that a picture that is nothing but a record, as you said
a few minutes ago, can't be much of a picture," said Roger. "I should
want something more in a picture, something that would stir me up. Why,
even Miss Farren's there isn't exactly a record, because you have
something more than just eyes and nose and hair. She looks as if she
would be fun to talk to, and as for the 'Horse Fair,' which was the other
picture that we decided was a record, why that has in it more than just a
lot of horses."
"If Rosa Bonheur had wanted merely to draw some horses, she might have
strung them along in a row so that we could get an idea of their size and
color and could make a guess at their weight, but here we see them in
action and we know that they are in good spirits and we feel some
sympathy with the men who have a hard time to hold them."
"Yes, that picture stirs me a little, too."
"That is because both 'Miss Farren' and the 'Horse Fair' are real
pictures. Any picture that tries to be more than merely a photographic
reproduction must stir your emotions in one way or another," said Miss
Daisy. "Now as we look at this picture, do you think the artist put into
it everything that she saw on the road that morning when she passed this
group of men and horses?"
"I dare say not," said Della, "because there would be likely to be dogs
and boys with the men, and perhaps some ugly houses in the background."
"Why do you suppose she didn't put everything in?"
"Why, a picture ought to try to be beautiful, oughtn't it, and some of
those things might be ugly, or there might be so many of them that it
would be confusing."
"Those are both good reasons," said Miss Daisy. "They both show that the
artist has to _select_ the things that he thinks will be of the greatest
interest to the people who look at his pictures."
"Now when he has picked them out, what should you say the next step was?"
They were all rather blank at this question but after a while Roger said
slowly, "Evidently she picked out just so many as being the best looking
ones to put in the picture; and she didn't like them all facing the
audience, ready to bob their heads at you as you look at them; she made
them trot along the road in a natural way."
"Certainly," approved Miss Graham. "She _arranged_ what she had selected
so that they would be natural and--"
"And so that the colors would show well?" asked Ethel Brown.
"Yes, so that there would be contrasts of color that would be pleasing to
the eye. Then there should be _balance_. Have you any idea what that
means?"
Nobody had.
"I wonder if you haven't all noticed a Japanese print that Margaret has?"
"You mean the one with big green leaves up in one corner and the
grasshopper clinging to a tendril?" asked Helen.
"That's the one," returned Miss Daisy. "Did it ever occur to you that
those leaves were all crowded off into one corner of the picture?"
"I never thought of it," said Margaret, "and I have looked at it every
day for a year. They are, aren't they?"
"But it didn't affect you unpleasantly, did it?"
"Why, no. I think it's a pretty picture," said Ethel Brown.
"It is," agreed Miss Graham; "but what device did the artist use to make
you feel comfortable about it, and to make you forget that he had put a
bunch of foliage up in one corner and had left more than one-half of his
sheet blank?"
Nobody could answer this question and Miss Graham had to give the
explanation herself.
"It's all a question of balance," she said. "The great mass of white
paper in the lower right hand part of the picture balances the mass of
green leaves in the upper left hand corner. The green is a heavier
looking color than the white, and it therefore takes a larger amount of
white to balance the green. The Japanese who made this painting
understood that, and he has so arranged his leaves and his grasshopper,
that the eye is entirely pleased by the balance that results. If Rosa
Bonheur has managed wisely there should be masses of light and dark,
balancing each other, and there should be spaces and solids, balancing
each other."
"Has she done it? It doesn't worry me any," said Roger. "I think she must
have succeeded."
Keeping Miss Graham's explanation in mind they took another look at the
Napoleon picture and concluded that Meissonier also knew what he was
about.
"'Composition' means the putting together of a picture, doesn't it?"
asked Helen. "I should think that the composition of a picture that has
so many figures, must be extremely difficult."
"Far more difficult, of course, than one for which the artist has
selected fewer objects."
"And of two artists producing complicated pictures like these, he is the
better who gives an effect of simplicity."
"Suppose that Rosa Bonheur had noticed that one of the men struggling
with the horses had his face bound up with a cloth; does that have
anything to do with the picture?"
They all agreed that it had not.
"Then she was perfectly right to leave out any object that would distract
the observer's mind. She put into this picture of horses going to the
horse fair only such things as would make the onlooker think of the
beauty and spirit of the horses as shown by their handsome coats and by
the difficulty which the men had in controlling them, and his imagination
would be stirred to wonder as to which of these fine animals was to win a
prize. Everything which might compete with these simple ideas the artist
left out of the picture."
"It must have been awfully hard to do such a lot of legs," said Ethel
Blue, who knew a little about drawing.
"An artist has to know a good deal about anatomy," returned Miss Graham.
"He must know how the human body is made, and the horse's body, too, if
he is to do a picture like this, and he even must know something about
the under-structure of the earth. He must make the lines of those legs
all move harmoniously. Look at this Napoleon picture once more."
Once again they stood before "Friedland."
"If you were to prolong the up-standing lines of weapons and helmets you
would find that they were parallel or tended toward some point possibly
outside of the picture. Unless an appearance of confusion is desired it
would not do to have lines leading in every direction."
"It would make a picture look every which way, wouldn't it?" said Ethel
Blue.
"Attention to such points as this helps to give expression to the whole
picture," went on Miss Daisy. "Not only do the figures in the pictures
have their own expression, but the picture as a whole may wear an
expression of peace, like that quiet landscape over there; or of
confusion, like this picture of the attempted assassination of a pope, or
of orderly excitement, like that cavalry charge yonder."
As they turned from one canvas to another the Club realized the truth of
what Miss Graham was saying.
"That is a fact, isn't it?" agreed Tom. "You don't have to see the look
on the fellows' faces to get the general effect of the picture even from
a distance."
"We've been talking so much about color schemes in connection with
Dorothy's new house, that I am sure the phrase is familiar to you," said
Miss Graham. "Look at the color schemes of these pictures around us. Do
you see that there are no discords because a color note is struck and all
of the other shades and colors harmonize with it? That battle rush, for
instance, is a study in red. Compare that with the dull misty blues,
greens, and greys in LePage's 'Jeanne d'Arc.'"
They went from one picture to another and proved the truth of this
statement to their satisfaction.
"Now we'll call our lesson done," said Miss Graham. "We'll have some
luncheon downstairs and when we come up we can let Roger have his heart's
desire, and we'll give the afternoon to looking at the Morgan and Altman
and Riggs collections of wonders. I doubt if there was ever gathered
together anywhere three such groups. The Altman pictures are choice, the
Riggs armor is unequalled anywhere in the world, and the Morgan
collection is the finest general collection ever owned by a private
individual."
It was a weary but a happy party that returned to Rosemont in the late
afternoon.
"One of these days is awfully hard on your head," confessed Roger, as he
was talking to his mother about the Club's experience, "but it certainly
is good for your gray matter."
"We're going to remember whenever we look at pictures again," said Ethel
Brown.
"And there are lots of things in it that we shall think about when we
look over the decorating in our house," insisted Dorothy.
"What I thought was the nicest of all was the way Miss Graham taught us.
It was just like talking. I think she is awfully nice," was Ethel Blue's
decision.