The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, May 22, 1895, Page 8

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, WEDNESDAY, MAY 22, 1895. "HOME AND ART AT THE WOrAN’S CONGRESS. TS To about every fifty women at the ‘Woman'’s Congress there is one man. He is usually very old or very young, gray haired or a boy. There are occasional ex- ceptions; but whenever one sees the coat and vest and can tell it from the mannish woman'’s severe imitation—which isn’t al- ways easy—the wearer is almost sure to be at the end or at the beginning of life. It is interesting to watch the men at the congress.. Their attitude is either wholly respectful or uneasily skeptical. A white- haired man with flowing beard sits with his benignant old face turned toward the stage, a wrinkled hand curved behind his ear to catch the sound from the speaker’s lips. A young man with dark down upon his upper lip shifts uneasily upon his feet—for the women are ungallant enough to permit men to stand—a half sneer upon his face, an air of embarrassment; but in his eye the longing to fight back, the de- sire to express his contempt of the logic and the wisdom of the new woman. But he never does. Miss Anthony told proudly how she spoke out in meeting when men only were aliowed to speak; but no man has appeared who is brave enough to beard the new woman in her hall. If a man rises in the audience to discussa question it is only to agree with the speaker or to suggest some extension of her thought. The men who have addressed the congress from the stage have said nothing which was not complimentary to the sex. Mayor Sutro told them that nature had endowed them with a finer quality of brain power, an intuitive knowledge of character and correct judgment. The Rev. J. K. McLean said mournfully that it was not his fault that he had not been born a woman. The atmosphere at the congress is wholly pleasant, even complimentary. The president speaks of this ‘‘beautiful paper,” this “interesting and excellent contribution,”” this *“‘thoughtful and beau- tiful address.” So far Mrs. Stetson bas been the only fault-finder, and as she speaks of women’s faults almost as if she included herself among them, they listen to her very good naturedly. “We women don’t know our own busi- ness,” said Mrs. Stetson Monday. “If the Americans are a Nation of dyspeptics it is American women's cooking which has made them so. The great cooks have been men—not women. *That a woman's touch is beautifying and that she has natural taste is one of the myths women are fed uvbon. We don’t know beauty when we see it, and the way we decorate our Lomes and our dresses is a refutation of the popular idea that women have superior artistic sense.”’ Mrs. Stetson laughed as if in apprecia- tion of a great good joke, and her audience langhed with her and applauded her senti- ments and the graceful way in which they were delivered. Mrs. Stetson is one of the easiest speakers of the congress and she is very popular, but the women who dared not discuss publicly the principles, artistic or otherwise, upon which they adorned their homes and themselves, made sarcas- ts upon the last speaker as they haired grandmoth- iified matrons had listened re- to a paper upon the early years of childlife from one who bhad no experi- enceas a motner. It did not occur to them to resent the speaker's assumption of superiority when there was talk of ba- bies, but matters of fashion are sacred, evidently, like questions of faith. Discus- sion does not affect them. It is clear, too, that taste is an elusive thing not to be taught from platiorms or shaken by ridicule. “And over the mantel,” said the Rev. Charles Wendte of Oakland yesterday, in describing the old New England home, ‘there hung a picture done in human hair of a grave and a weepingwillow over it.” “And it was pretty, too!” stoutly main- tained the slight, silver-haired woman with gold-rimmed spectacles who sat be- side me. The new woman is a composite. At ‘present she is in a transition state and her conversation shows a queer compound of honsewifely interests and congress topics. She has learned the patter of clubs about art, morals and political questions; and she is merciless in inflicting her second- hand stock upon her unfortunate neighbor, whois herself bursting with newly acquired impressions. But pity is out of place at the Woman’s Congress. You must be either lamb or woli—you must talk or some one else will talk you to death. From all this babel of heated discussion which precedes and follows a session of the congress significant phrases are dropped: “It's a woman's duty to know these things. [ was saying to Mrs.—"" “I like the way she talks. She's easy and she’s natural and she talks sense.” “No, I couldn’t get here yesterday. was washday and—" “Tell me frankly, don’t you think men are prejudiced against women suffragists and not against woman suffrage ?” “Look at the one in red with the big black velvet sleeves.” “Well, for my part I intend to be fit for it when it does come.” “She came in to dinner, you know, and I was so flustered at really having her in my house that T forgot to put any of my pretty things on the table. It's good I didn’t remember about them during the dinner, for then I should have thought— Oh, dear, dear, dear!”’ ““The Woman’s Congress will please come to order,” said Mrs. Cooper. MiriaM MICHELSON. Fringeni MORNING SESSION. Election of Officers—San Francisco Women Honored—The Trustees. The morning session of the Woman's Congress yesterday was devoted entirely to business and to the election of officers for the ensuing year. The hall was filled when Mrs. Sarah B. Cooper opened the proceedings at 10 o’clock. The reports of officers were all of an en- couraging nature. Mrs. Ada Van Pelt, the vice-presiaent, who has lately been per- forming the duties of recording secretary, regretted, in her report, the fact that the late president, Mrs. John Vance Cheeny, had been forced to go to reside in the East: ‘At the earnest solicitation and the unanimous request of the ‘board, Mrs. Sarah B. Cooper was induced to accept the position. This we felt confident would meet with your hearty approval, and ex- perience has shown us that a wiser selec- tion could not bave been made.” The re- port stated that only once had the board failed to have a quorum, although since October weekly meetings had been held, and that never had the secretary had oc- casion to record a dissenting vote. “When a measure was carried on which there was a difference of opinion the minority grace- fuliy yielded to the majority.” Mrs. George T. Gaden, the correspond- Ing secretary, also made a detailed report. Mme. L. A. Sorbier, the treasurer, showed that the receipts for the past year amount- It ed to §120227 and the disbursements to $847 95, leaving a balance in hand of $354 54. The reports of officers having been ac- cepted, the president announced that nom- inations for officers were in order. Mrs. John F. Swift, the delegate from the Cen- tury Club, at once nominated Mrs. Sarah B. Cooper for president in a neat little speech which contained a tribute to Mrs. Cooper’s able administration of the office during the past year. Mrs. Laura deForce Gordon seconded the nomination. She also moved that the secretary be instructed to cast the ballot, according to the consti- tution of the organization. Mrs. Sarah B. Cooper was made president by acclama- tion, by a unanimous rising vote, the ladies cheering and waving their handker- chiefs. The same course was pursued with all last year’s officers, who were unani- mously re-elected, many complimentary speeches being made as to the way they had managed the preparations for the con- Tess. Mrs. Sarah B. Cooper, president; Mrs. AdaVan Pelt, vice-president-at-large ; Mrs. Charles 8. Nash, recording secretary; Mrs. George T. Gaden, corresponding secretary ; Mme. L. A. Sorbier, treasurer, having all been unanimously re-elected, the presi- dent announced that twelve nominations were in order for the remaining six mem- bers of the executive board. Several nomi- nations were made and declined. Among these were Mrs. Barstow and Mrs. Laura de Force Gordon. Mrs. Anderson then nominated Mrs. Nellie Holbrook Blinn, the president of the State Suffrage Society. This society, however. happens to have two presidents, each of whom has a follow- ing which believes her to be legally elected Brilliant Speakers Discoursed on the Beautiful, the Useful and the Audiences in Golden Gate Hall Yesterday the animal world, rivalin in its forms, colors and activity the beauty of unconscious nature. Rightly did the an- cient Greek call the world Kosmos; that is beauty. : that i{s not beautiful; much that is ugly and debased. Rightly understood, this only mekes the beautifnl more apparent and attractive to us. But how shall we come to this right un- derstanding of it? Man does not by hiscon- | stitution know what is beautiful any more than he apprehends instinetively what is true and what is right. The brute creation, indeed, seems to have this sense of the beautiful im planted in it as an unerring instinet. Mr. Dar- win shows us that the higher animals often exhibit & more refined and developed sense of beauty than the lowest order of man. The birds, for example, place a high yalue on the delicite tints and markings of their plumage. The more exquisite and refined the pettern the ter the esteem in which such birds are held among the_feathered tribe. This adornment fulfills anfimportant office in the preservation and perpetuation of the different species, the more beautiful birds being more sure of a mate than the less beautiful. Now that which is instinctive in the animal and remains so with it is lost, as in man we rise to the highest ranks of the creation. Man seems to have an innate craving for the beautiful, but he has no such developed and read made sense of it as displayed by the bee, the bird and even the fish. The savage, for in- stance, fhideously gashes and tattoos his skin, the Indian mother flattens the head of her offspring, the Chinese parent compresses its feet and the European its waist—all in a mis- tuken striving for beauty. And what mon- strosities in color, outline” and proportion are not to-day held tobe beautiful by persons of comparative enlightenment and culture! It. is evident that the instinct for beauty which is automatic and complete in the animalis very foeble and uncertain in man. It needs to be awakened and developed Man must learn by gradual npper(‘efiflml the 1aws of color, form, proportion and harmony. This is a slow laborlous process in human edu- cation, but itis as necessary in the sphere of the beautiful as it is in that of truth or virtue, while by it man rises to the highest levels of esthetic culture. Now, the guide, the interpreter through whom man learns fo know and enjoy the beau- tiful in nature and human life, is Art, Art is the ministering angel, the heavenly interpre- and Mrs. Chandler of Atameda springing to her feet exclaimed, “‘Mrs. Blinn the president of the State Suffrage Society! That's a matter to be decided in the courts.”’ Mrs. Cooper, ignoring this little ripple on the smooth surface of the congress’ pro- ceedings, declared Miss Blinn's nomina- tion in order and instructed the secretary to prepare the ballot. Only thirty-two votes were registered for the nominee, however, which were not sufficient to elect. The final result of the balloting was that Mrs. Garrison Girst, Mrs. Charlotte Perkins Stetson and Mrs. W. E. Hale were re- elected, while tHe three new members of the board elected were Mrs. J. F. Bwift, Mrs. A. A. Sargent and Mrs, Nellie Bless- ing Eyster. The ladies of the auxiliary had spenta good deal of time and ingenuity upon the decorations, having even gone to the trouble of obtaining the statuette of Lucre- zia Mott, which was exhibited at the World’s Fair, from the sculptress, Miss Caroline 8. Brooks, who is attending the congress. It was some surprise, therefore, to these ladies when Mrs. Bailey, one of the members in the audience during the business seseion, rose in some wrath and sharply criticized them for their lack of patriotism in not having the American flag among the decorations. “The whole idea of our decorations,” said Mrs. W. E. Hale, commenting on the matter afterward, “‘was to make the hall look as much like the drawing-room of a home as possible. We did consider whether it would be well to decorate with flags, but decided not to do so, as people do not decorate their drawing-rooms with flags.” Mme. Louise Sorbier added that no one reverenced the American flaz more than she did, but it was the outside and not the inside of their homes that patriotic citizens decorated with flags. At the meeting, how- ever, the ladies avoided anything like a dis- cussion by goodnaturedly explaining that the lack of flags did not spring from a lack of patriotism. The balloting occupied so much time that it was nearly half-past 1 before the meeting adjourned. p THE AFTERNOON SESSION. Art In the Home Is Well Handled by Some Brilliant People. Another packed house faced the presi- dent of the congress when the call to order was made at 2:30 o'clock. There was no such thing as standing room to be had, and many were fain to be content with positions in the hallway to even geta glimpse of the pretty stage. The Rev. Charles W. Wendte of Oakland, the writer of the first paper, “The Func- tion of Art in the Home,” was introduced by Mrs. Cooper as. one who had always boen_ the champion of woman, and who, by_lns Ppresent appearance, gave but another evidence of his devotion. The appearance of Mr. Wendte was greeted with applause. He saif As we look at the world we live in how all- pervldlng and impressive is the beauty it dis- plays. The sky, with its tender blue lighted up with golden suvshine; the clouds that float and gather in_shapes of ‘exquisite loveliness; the go us flushes of color that throng the gates or sunset; the silvery light of the moon, keeg:n‘ soft vigll over a sleeping world. The earth, too—what a marvel of beauty it isi The mountains soar in grand outline into the lon of cloud and storm; the rivers roll in silent majesty through the landscape; the sen tosses its tumultuous waves in never-ceasing graceful curves; the flelds and forests are green with the fresh verdure of spring, tinted with the deepe~ hues of autumn, or sparkle back the winter sun from a million tiny crystals of snow, Al loveliness of creation is placed But there is also much in the world | profundity and range of their thought, but s ar as they were deficient in imagination and | esthetic culture they were inharmoniousty de- | veloped—as much so as the galley slave, who, chained for long vears to his rowing-bench, | | may have the shoulders of a giant, but cannot | | walk a single mite. We commonly speak of art as if it were some- thing necessarily confined to artists and dille- tanti, 1o museums and to concert-rooms. In reality, however, whether we are aware of it or not, art is 2n indispensable element in every man’s life and enters into the minutest detail of his experience. Grant me & moment to il- lustrate this. Enter your own home with me. Surely here ismuch that is not needed for & mere habitation. Four walls, a roof and floor, a door and window, a few indispensable arti- | cles of furniture,would suffice for that. Whom | among us, however, would this satisiy? Nota home, even the very poorest,which does not ad- mit some little decoration, something to please the eye as well as minister to the comfort of its occupant. It may be only a graceful curve in thelines of the room, the paper on its walls or the pictures that hang upon them—for every one has something to «xpend for a picture, if | it be only an etching, a cheap lithograph, a [ chromo or the photograph of one who is dear tous. The very arrangementof the furniture of the room and the disposition of the various articles in it display taste and an attempt to | express the beautiful. More than this, you dis- { p]n{ artin your dress. It must be not simpi}' | well-fitting"and warm, but clean and hand- | some. Art enters into your conversation and | manners, your social tact and courtesy, the hospitalities you dispense more or less grace- |fully. It 18 & ruling influence in the | nursery slso. The toys and picture-books | of the children, the songs they listen |to and learn, the fairy tales you tell y : | them, their infant games and festivities | are so many educators in the science of the | beautiful. And not only at the opening, but | at the close of life also, art lends its gracious ministry to adorn the*funersl casket of the dead, to #ing songs of divinest trust, to lay | flowers upon the grave and raise emblems of | love and hope above it. ! Go with me into the crowded streets, and | everywhere in_the busy haunts of men you will " discover the reconciling and uplifting in- | fluence of art. The structures that line the streets are destined, perhaps, for the service | of the useful and the material—shrines of | mammon and the public service. Yet they held in poor repute in former times. Man was thought to be the center of the universe—all natural sciences there has come alsoa more ‘here is a gospel of beguty in fields and woods, in mountains and seas. The modern masters of art, poets like Words- worth, Goethe, Shelley, Burns and Ruskin; painters like Kensett, Turner, Rousseau, Corot aud Chureh, are its Friflleged apostles. They show us the material universe reliected in the | mirror of their observation and reflection. They portray its glorious beauty, so free from passion and sin, How faithful .and devout are these worshipers at the shrine of | nature! The painter Turner, taking his | place in a lifeboat, goes out in a tempest- uous seanot only_to succor a vessel in distress but that he may the better observe thes color of the waves as they rise mountain-like above his tiny craft. William Hunt becomes a pil- grim to the Holy Land that he may the more closely study the scene of the life and labors of Jesus, and give a correct local coloring to the pictures in which he glorifies the memory of the Christ. Our American Church penetrates into the wild fastnesses of the Andes and the Amazon, that he may reflect on his glowing canvas the splendor of & morning in the tropics. But while the landscapé is a noble form of art, yet the beauty of nature culmi- nates in man. ‘Nature is the brilliant setting which the external world gives to human his- tory in its various experiences and activities. The modern artist has felt this truth as vividly as theancient, and songht to_express itin that form of art so congenial to our day, which we call the school of genre painting. This presents to us varlous simple naive scenes taken directly from hu- man and daily life, and either serious, senti- mental or humorous in their character. This is pre-eminently the art of home and common Hfe. It expresses the kindly sense of human relationship, and we love it because we rind ourselves and our expressions reflected in it. Those of us who have been so fortunate as to see the Dutch cabinet pictures, or admirable works of Fortuny, Knaus and Breton, of Millet and Mnger von Bremen will understand the secret of their charm and power over us, Admitting then the excellence of modern as of ancient art, how can we best promote it in our day? The various associations for promoting the A FEW OF THE BRIGHT SPEAKERS WHO TALEED OF ART IN THE HOME, [Sketched by a “Call” artist.) ter who translates the divine word of beauty intoa human and comprehensible language by which we are enabled to understand it our- sélves and to convey it to others. Art “holds up its mirror to nature” and reflects therein such phases and moods of beauty as especially appeal to man’s imagination and minister to his inner craving for the harmouious and per- fect. Whatever is lovely, or pleturesque, or sublime or awful in the Iandscape, whatever is pleasing or ennobling in human history, what- ever visions of beauty and bliss come to the soul kindled bi; the higher emotions, art seeks to embody and pre- serve for us. She speaks her message to mankind in many different tones. Sometimes she chooses poetry as the vehicle of her reve- lation. The poets of the race, Isaiah, Homer and Virgil, Dente and Shakespeare, Goethe and Tennyson, are 5o many Artists who use the flexible medium of lenguage in which to re- roduce for us their conceptions of nature and Eumln life. Sometimes the message comes through the sculptors and painters, whose glorious creations adorn and ennoble the world. Such were Phidias and Michael An- elo, Raphael, Rembrandt and others of that fmmor!: company. Itisthe beautifur which architecture seeks to represent to us. In early ages, on the plains of Equt and Assyrls, in ]g'rlmld and temple and palace, the artist sought for the colossal as the highest form of beauty. Under the sunshine of Greece the builders of the Par- thenon found it rivaled in the Harmonius, while the religlous enthusiasm of medieval Christianity reared those grand cathedrals, whose heaven-soaring spires and pinnacles are the symbol of an infinite longing after the beauty of holiness. Last ot all the arts to be develoged is music, the greatest and divinest of all. For she com- bines in herself what is most characteristic in all the others, She has the delicacy and pre- cision of the t's art, the warmth and full- ness of painting and the chastenessand har- mony of wnlgmro and architecture. A sym- phony of Beethoven is thesublimated language of_beauty—it is the transfiguration of art. Such, then, are the various arts which com- mend the gospel of beauty to the human soul. Their mission is to lift man above the drudgery and care of material life, to win him from baser leasures and gnrl\lils. to fill his eyes with gelu'.y and his heart with gladness. "Art thus mes & high means of cuiture to mankind, & leading instrumentality in the divine educa- tion of the race. We know that this wasesteemed the function | of art in times gone by and among the most cultivated nations of antiquity. Such, however, is not the esteem it enjoys in our own day and generation. Our young Na- tion, thus far in its history, has been too much absorbed in the toils and cares for daily bread t0 enable it to devote much thought to the ideal interests of man, except as these con- cerned his personal freedom and social and po- litical rights. For the refining pursuits of art we have as yet little taste or leisure. We leave them to be cultivated by the few, or if we do indulge in them it is as an occasional smusement rather than as a continued and serious study. This, however, is a great mistake on our part, and one for which we pay dearly bothin the character and scope of our American life. Art is not an amusement merely—it is & high and dignified occupation of thé human mind. It is not to be contined to the few—it i< for all, as science is for all, as virtue is for all. One of the greatest of English writers laid down Miltou’s “Paradise Lost” with the re- mark “What does it prove?” Another, Sir Isaac Newton, spoke contemptuously of the marbles in a nelghboring art gallery as “stone dolls.” Such men may have possessed a pro- digious reasoning power and exceied in the disclose graceful outlines, and are adorned with sculptured columns and variegated colors, not always harmonious, perhaps, but el striving for the beautiful. The eager crowd, intent on its daily bread, surges through the great thoroughfares,but here and therea knot of idlers stand with arrested attention. Is it be- fore the window of the baker and the market- man, dispensers of our daily bread? No, it is the print thop or the glittering shows of the jewelers which hold them. Itis some beauti- Jul picture, or some satirical caricature which scores the vices and tollies of the time with merciless justice, Now, admitting the universality and power of art, in modern as in ancient life, is it not important whatkind of art our people occupy themselves with? Can it be a matter of in- difference to us what music is played to them, what songs they sing, what acting they wit- ness, what pictures they admire, what orato; they applaud? For as there is ugliness an deformity in nature, as well as beauty, so there isaléo an ignoble art which presenis us with the commonplace, the vulgar and the vicious. | The moral element enters into art as well as | into every other department of life. Thereisa true art which is an angel sent of God to uplift and inspire man,and there is a faise art, | lying and deceitiul spirit, waich strives to harm and destroy humanity. A good picture, anoble poem, a lofty strain of music havea beingnant influence on mun’s life. They drive | quicken what is best and divinest in him. But | bad pictures, commonplace music and sensual dramas cast a baleful shadow over man’s soul. | Now, our land is full of such debasing pic- | tures. They stare at us from the posters of the theater, where shameless women and degraded | men advertise their low attractions. They are | on exhibition at print shops and newstands in the woodcuts of the sensational literature of the day,in which murders, executions and | lawless deeds furnish the staple attractions. | They are seen in the photographsand sensuous | paintings of the tleshly school, which are too often exhibited in our more pretentious picture- stores. But true art is ennobling in its influence. Give to the people such an art and it will save them from the sham and the shame which too often ;)nsses for art in modern society. We learn {rom history and the impressive memo- rials of the art-life of ancient nations. which have come down to us in column and statue and inting, how universal and how pro- foundly impressive for good was this love of the beautiful in the civiiizations of Greece and Rome and the medieval republics. As a recent writer says: “Art always and everywhere has been a protest against evil— against the raging fire of sensu the dead ashes of materialism alike. Greek art E:ve ‘witnessin lhevpu!lonlesl splendor of ideal auty. * * * Wasthereanevilin the cruel and stern dogmatism of the medieval chureh? Then every sweet picture of the holy child or the virgin mother wasa message to stay the fire and sword and rack of the inquisition. And vet more, is there an evil still existing in the hard, grinding, pitiless competition of our own times? Then poetry an: give per- petual witness against 1t in every delicate rendering_ of nature by the painter, looking upon which we can say, ‘How beautiiul! in every refined thought of the t or sweet strain of the composer, by which we can Lift ourselves even for 4 moment from the dast.” Such was the art-life of other days. Has it then a mission in our own time and genera- a out what is low and base in his nature and | to production and love of art which are increas- ingly to be found in our large cities are doing a greatdeal to encourage artists, improve the public taste and spread a knowledge of the true rl’inciples of beauty among the people. But the best ally in this work is the esthetic culture of the home. As one visits the loan art exhibits so frequently held in our larger towns and views their collections of articles of beauty he is impressed with the truth that much’ if not the greater part of the art activity of our time is devoted to the decoration and adornment of the home. Once art was the al- most_exclusive possession of the palace and the church, the forum and the theater. The Greeks allowed their weelthy citizens only a moderate amount of objects of art in their pri- vate houses, and the dwellings of the humbler classes were bare and mean. But to-day art lavishes her choicest treasures on the adorn- ment of the temple of the family life. It pro- duces in vastabundance the elegant furniture and fittings, the tavestries, carvings, kera- mics and pictures that make home the most beautiful shrine, the loveliest spot on earth to us. ‘We know how very slowly this has been ar- rived at in this New World, hot vnrelentingly our stern Puritan and Quaker ancestors crushed out every manifestation of the in- stinct for beauty, the craving to express it in their habitations and churches. To them beauty was a wile of the devil to lure the soul its destruction. A studied plainness | and barrenness in the home was reck- | oned among the chief of domestic | virtues. A golden crook-necked squash or string of red and yellow ~ onions ndent from the rafters of the cefling, a Eo ished firedog on the hearth, were the only its of color that lit up their somber dwelling. Thisdread of artand ignorance of its true rinciples has descended far into onr own day. ho does not remember the parlors of our New England homes, with their green blinds closely shut and shades drawn to keep the sun from fading the carpet with its hideous pat- terns in red, yellow and black; the fireboard | ‘with its coarse wall-paper design; the hearth- | rug, on which was reyealed a reclining tiger with sore eyes: the huge decalcomania vases filled with sanded grasses or big bouquets of pa- per flowers,while on the wall hung horrid daubs of landscapes or splotchy family portraits, ,angular and staring, a faded sampler or two with pious doggerel worked in worsted; over the mantelpiece a picture done in human hair Tepresenting a tomb, s weeping willow and a disconsolate mourner. If the head of the fam- ily was a widoweror had married again the silver coffin-plate of his buried wiie, with true New England thrift,was saved from the earth’s damps and decays and placed as the chief or- nament on the mantelpiece—perhaps alsoasa grim reminder to his second helpmeet. Such was the art environment out of which has been evolved the American home of to- day. It is not to be wondered at that it should :li : be so lacking in true artistic feeling and aste. As one goes about and sees the current attempt to express the beauti- ful, especially among humble peog!e, he is impressed alternately with the ludicrous- ness and the pathos of their endeavor to empty one’s china closet into the parlor, or skyline enormous family portraits, or clutter up the room with the rubbish from the ancestral aftic—thisis only & passing fad. It is neither beautiful nor artistic. What is lacking in our American homes is tion? Bust we sigh over its decline and fall in this artistically 5@. encrate age? In two de- partments of art at jeast we may claim superi- ority over the painters of the past. First: In landscape painting, in the conscientious, faith- ful, devout portrayal of the world of nature which surrounds us. This branch of art was not money chiefly but good taste. One woman by an investment of thousands of dollars in house furnishing and decoration will only succeed in rroclljmlng the more loudly her want of artistic refinerent. Another woman Wwith & tack hammer and s few brass nails and bits of cheesecloth, with a few cheap etchings the rest existed but for him, and had no inter- | est apart from him. But with the rise of the | ;rust appreciation of the loveliness of nature. | - Artistic to Big and photographie reproductions will ma | feel as you enter her deors that here dw s a lover of the beautiful, a priestess of the divine, expressed through the forms and ari. It is partly a matter of instine more & matter of education. May the Woman’s | Congress do its part to make the function of | ert in domestic life better appreciated and | better observed. Thus will the spirit within, in its purity, serenity, tenderness and trust, mirror the loveliness of the world without; thus shall we | Yorship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. For, believe me, there can be no true worship of the beautiful which is not also an adoration of the truer, the good, the holy. In a high sense these ideals of mankind are only the dlfl'emnlasfaecv,s of the one eternal perfection. They reveal to us in different ways the char- acter and life of God. The German poet, Hein- rich Heine, that passionate lover of the beauti- ful, ignored this 4ruth. He pursued the divine' goddess with a sensuous and un- clean desire. At last, shattered in body and mind, just before his death, he tells us, he dragged himself into the gallery of the Louvre and there knelt down alone béfore that exquisite fragment of the Greek sculptor, the Venus of Milo. Liiting up his eyes he sighed: “Alas! fair goddess of beauty, I have served Jousll my life and is this t0 ‘e my reward? h descend in your heavenly grace and strength and lift me out of my suffering and weakness!” And she, looking pityingly upon him, repliea: “Alas!'poor mortal. How gladly would I raise you from your misery and woe! But you see yourself how impossible it is; I haye no arms!” Mere beauty, divorced from the moral ele- ment, has no help or healing to bring to man. It cannot lift him out of his sensnous and earthly life into anything nobler or better. It is only when we seé its divine kinship with truth'and virtue, when all our vision and our art are dedicated to moral and, spiritual ideals that it becomes the interpretef and revealer of the divine to us; & word proceeding from the mouth of God. Mrs. Charlotte Perkins-Stetson and Mrs. Sarah Pratt-Carr took part in discussing the paper just read. Mrs. Stetson said she wishefto make just one suggestion on the remarks made by the Rev. Mr. Wendte, and that was that taking the statements about the public art of the Greeks, there was a noticeable lack of art in American cities. Mrs. Carr said she thought the fact that people of large means failed in friendly, neiifiborlv, brotherly and sisterly feeling to those of no means had a great deal to do with the lack of art development. The present economic system made it neces- sary that half of the world should spend every penny it earned in bread and butter and clothing, and the time spent in this manner left them no time for the consider- ation of art. Then Rev. Mr. Wendte had a few more words, in which he said he agreed with Mrs. Stetson as to the lack of public art, which he greatly deplored. He told a hu- morous story of an Indiana man who called upon the sculptor Reinhart in Rome and wished to have made a cast-iron copy of the column of Trajan, because it was cheaper than bronze. It brought down the house, and Mr. Wendte bowed himself out amid great applause. Miss Ina Griffin of Qakland was next in- troduced by the president to read a paper on ‘“The Social Value of Music in the Home, and How to Secure Its Advance- ment.” She was received with applause, ana read as follows: If the highest expression of the genuine al- truism is the home, then the home must be the center of all things that tend to produce con- tentment, gence and joy. In any adequate scheme of lite the emotions must be trained and educated. That music arouses the emo- tions and thot emotions nerve to action are . axioms. It is also coming to be understood that when we hear musie, not Mmpl{ as a succession of agreeable sounds, but intelligently and sympathetically, we are being trained in the exercise of our emotions as the gymnasium trains us in the exercise of our limbs. Pain and weeriness are forgotten under the stimulus of music, moods of exaltation are induced, tired nerves are soothed—and where are all these things needed more than in the home? Imake no extravagant claim that music is the business or motive of the home, but I do claim that it is the sweetest recrea- tion. Music in its truest sense must become a civilizer, inspirer and purifier of human life. Even as a jingle and noise for the poor, music intensifies {he sense of living, and, as the mere toy of the rich, it has added much to the fullness of life. It will not be denied that there is, broadly speaking, no musical life on our western coast, or, indeed, in America. The musical in- terest which struggles to exist is not the inter- est of the state, nor is it the interest of the home, but the not altogether altruistic in- terest of & professional or semi-professional class. While in Europe the state main- tains in every city of note its opera and great orchestra, and in every capi- tal its authorized school of music, with well- established scholarships for musical students of unusual merit—maintains military bands of unriveled excellence and looks upon the occu- pants of the chairs of fine arts in its universi- ties as men of great distinction, our own coun- try fails to give official recognition of any kind to the most important of these subjects. It is safe to say that if Americans ever become a musical people the germ must be planted and the deveiopmeat and growth must extend out-. ward from the home. Through the intervention ot the state, the most common peasant of Germany becomes familiar during his three years of military ser- vice with the invigorating marches of parade days, the magnificent choral of Sabbath ser- vice and the bewitching lighter rhythms of con- cert pieces. The schoolboy of the gymnasium is given a thorough tmlmni in part-singing, and when he reaches the honored state of student proper, he is enabled to join with his fellow-students in singing intelligent- 1{ and musically, at their great commers the beautiful folk-Songs and inspiring patri. otic hymns which have been chosen as student songs. The man of high social position who has not studied music in some of its depart- ments, who cannot discuss the characteristics of various schools of composition, 15 the ex- ception and not the rule. The contrast with American conditions is indeed great. It is not djfficult to arrive at the cause of this lack of int€rest or taste for art. Whatever gcniuu may have escaped to this country rom England or Holland in the days of our national infancy was desiroyed in the struggle for personal as well as national existence. When opera was being introduced into Germany, when Rembrandt was painting in Amsterdam, our forefathers were carrying on a fierce struggle with hardship and poverty on the bleak shores of New England. While Beethoven was childishly giving out faint glimpsesoi the genius which was tosurprise and delight the world, whiie Handel, Haydn and Mozart, Goethe and Schiller were at the height of thefr activities, our country was prowing toward the Declaration of Independence and the Revolution.. When at the close of the war people began to live more quietly ir the colonial centers, when the more spiritual side of man might have as- serted itself, the religious narrowness of Puri- tanism forbade the cultivation of any taste which might lead to frivolity. No doubt this religious narrowness has been and still is one great cause of the insufficient hold that music bas taken upon our home life 1n America. Olll'gh'ln have been given a start toward a_knowledge of good music, but we shall not be able to attain a_genuine, worthy and eongenial family life until this American rush and expectancy of some indefinite state of better times to come has been counteracted, until we have learned to mg and get some up- lifting enjoyment out of each day. And one of the Erelt influences toward this end will be at hand when the taste for what is good in litera~ ture and art has grown tobe realand genuine, when music 18 thought of as an actual Elcmr in social existence, when it shall be a usual thing for young people to meet together of an evening, or of & Sunday eafternoon, to give expression in an intelligent way to that greatest form of musical composition —ensemble or chamber musiec. For in this “musiciren,” as the Germans term it—this making music in an unproiessional way, is the really helpful, ennobling influence of “music. When musicians play for the love of the music itself, for the great pleas. ure which cowes from interpreting noble thoughts in a nobie way, then music is brogd- ening—more than that, it is uplifting. But, some mother will urge, we have given our children music lessons year aiter year, and it bas not resulted in any great pleasurs for them or for other people. e hear nothing but practicing all day long. In too many cases this will prove true, and the fault must be ascribed 1o the teachers, but partly too, to the mothers. Who of the young matrons of to-day has not had instrumental or vocal lessons in her girlhood? And how many of them have kept themselves sufficiently in practice to be ableto playorsing at home with their children? 1f children were 10 hear good or even indiffer- ent music constantly at home, if music were a pleasaut pert of their daily experience, their own. practicing would have a vastly different value. I know this to be a fact, for I have taught children in Germany and have taught them on this coast, and I find that the great difference in their work lies not in ability to learn nor in obedience to principles taught, but in the attitude of parents toward the work. I have admitted that a goodly portion of the blame for the insuflicient resalt of musie study in this country is to be attributed to the teach- ers. I will say, in partial defense, that the teacher’s work is more difficult in this country than in Europe, because there are so few out- side influences to assist him. But for that very reason his_work should not be so shallow s it has ofien been. I say shallow instead of narrow, for much of the teaching has been broed enough—touching here and there upon many things—but just as a shallow siream may spread in & broad sheet over glistening sands $0 does much musical work of the day prove lacidly pretty, or even brilliant; but The' ‘actual . musical experience beneath has no depth. Instruction should ~be such that ~ the Fupil may be fitted within a few years of study to delve for him- seli among the jewels of musical literature, to interpret at first reading the highest thoughts of tone poetry and to work inde- pendently. For, after all is said and done, a leacher in any field can only point the way. It is the pupil who must work out his own tuivation. PIf the general principles of work are wise and adequate, if they be not petty or Testricting to the pupil, if the chief aim be to give a real appreciation of true —musical thougnt, the problem of how to achieve re- sults’ will be found of easy solution. With Rome in view, and a faithful guidepost, the eager student ‘will not fail to keep the way. In emphasis of the fact that it is individual work which achieves results I should like to tell a story. Three summers ago 1 was one of & party of students making & walking tour through Eastern Switzerland. Late one aiternoon we came upon w wee little village nestled u against the mountains as if to guard itselt from sliding down into the lake of Wallenstadt. We stopped at a simple inn for refreshmentsand the peasant woman who served us began an animated conversation. Upon learning that we were ina sense “strolling musicians” she said: “My man is a musician, too, He is up on the mountain with the haying’—and tak ing down hotograph from the wall, s continued, “Can ye pick out my man from t roup?” Her pride in her “Mann” was so e gent that we could not do less then pick c the handsomest from a %mun of men, dently members of the village band. For! was kind! We had guessed correctly, and the woman cried, “How could you tell, low, that that was my mann?” She told us then {n de- tail that her husband was the leader of the «Blaserbund,” a band of players of wind in- struments, and that they wonld meet to prac- tice that very evening in the room where wo sat. She gave usa most cordia! invitation to remain, but we thought it best to push on to the next village before nightfall. As we ascended the path, we saw & man_approaching us with a heavy net of hay on his back and we recognized lim as the “Mann' of our peasant hostess. One of our party addressed him by name, whereat he seemed surprised and almost resentful; but when he learned that we had become ac- quainted with him through his wife’s praises and the photograph, he welcomed us heartily and begged us to return, to accept quarters for the night and hear his men play. We liked the appearance of the man, and thinking that it would, after all, be a new experieuce to hear the doubtful music of a peasant band, we ac- cepted the invitation. After a climb to a higher point for a view of the lake, the moun- tains beyond and the valley of the Upper Rhine, we returned to the viliage to be warmly greeted by our new friends. When the mem- bers of the Blaserbund began to assemble they roved to be manly fellows, ev.ry one of whom A sovreba sings early morning, raking, baling and bringing home hay from the higher levels. We settled ourselyes as comfortably as possible in the wide window seats, prepared to endure rather than to enjoy the playing, but though we had all listened to the finest military and civic bands of the Old World c&fiimh‘, we all agree that the music we heard that night will iinger in the memory of each one of us as the most wonderful horn-playing we ever heard , Such rare beauty of tone, such gradations, such depths and such lightness can scarcely be imagined. It was as though the beauty of the whole Alps, with their soft colorings, their graceful contours, their awe-inspiring heights, were concentrated and translated for the mo- ment into tone medium. How came it that these men, whose leader had had only such instruction as was to be gained during military service, should have achieved such results? As we discussed this question, on resuming our tramp the next day, it became clear to us that, given nobility of character, simplicity of thought and an appre- ciation of what is beautiful in nature, one will inevitably come to & proper understanding of what is highest in arf, provided one plunges fearlessly into the midst of it and makes it an intimate and familiar thing—s part of one's Teal life. Not to dwell too loni upon these jdeas, the summary of it all is: Parents should create a better home life—a merrier, more comfortable atmosphere—should make the children feel that there must be a reciprocal interest in the work and enjoyments of the whole family, should cause the children to study such in- struments as will combine in ensemble work, and result in a general ‘‘musiciren.” a making of good music, when the winter evenings or free afternoons come, then with the co-opera- tion of thoughtful and deepening work on the part of teachers, there will, in the course of time, spring up so general & kEnowledge that America shall have its great National school for musicians, its National opera in each great city, a minister of education and fine arts at Washington, and perhaps a resident_at the White House who can distinguish ““Yankee Doodle” from ““God Save the Queen.” Mrs. Foley of Stockton, Mrs, Charlotte Perkins Stetson and Mrs. Alice McComas of Los Angeles made brief comment on the gaper, the discussion being ended by Mrs. arah Pratt Carr, who advocated the aid- ing of local bands in small communities as a means of spreading musical tuste. Upon the suggestion of Mrs. Stetson, she men« tioned the case of one woman in Tulare, said to be the most musical city in Cali= fornia, in the cultivation of musical taste. That woman .oved music and art and in- stilled ber knowledge readily unto the minds of many pupils. Mrs, Charlotte Perkins Stetson was called upon to read a paper, “Simplicity in Decoration.”” Her appearance was greted with prolonged handclappings, and it was some moments before she could proceed. She talked for fully twenty minutes, and her remarks were so full of meat and her satire so fpou:mzd that the audience was in a roar of laughter almost from the beginning. She said: I have no ‘paper at all. WhatI asked {Mrs Carr to tell ‘you is really the keynote of the whole question to me. You have to love it and you have to do it. Itis not simple. You have 10 get at it to_get the real spirit of it, and it s not enough, it never will be enongh, to give it for the sake of making your living. You have to love itand give it because you love it and that is what that little woman has done. My own subject, I am not going to stick to. I want to talk around it and under it. Do you know the root of the word decoration? Do you know the kind of a word it is? I have only known it myseli a short time, so I have not much to boast of. I went and looked it up and found that it is from the same root as the words decorous and decorum and that it means essen« tially, ‘“that which belongs.” Decoration must belong to the thing it is of or it is not decoration. You know the Ty BY WEARING Goodycar Welt Shocs Try It. SHOE DEALERS SELL THEM. D™ Goodyear Welts are LEATHER SEOES —not Rubber. 9000400000000090004. 900000000000000000000000000000000000000000000440v040440000600040094 0. |