The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, February 7, 1897, Page 18

18 THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 7 1897. A NINETEENTH GENJURY PAINTER WHO RANKS WITH THE OLD L0 speak disparagingly of modern | JAPY intelligence; to sigh and shake the head and murmur that the race of giants isextinct isto bring proof positive that | Philisiinism may not claim you for its own, This peint of view has distinct ad- | vantages. 1t permits of no argument and | limits the expectations. The unruly | genius may start in upon his career with discreet dreams of painting as nearly like or as much unlike Velasquez, or Monet, or Vandyke, or Titian, or Manet as pos- sible if only be impress into his work *‘the modern spirit.” Heaven knows whatthat spirit may be, but the genius of to-day must not hope for popularity without it. | There are Dutch master-, a few centuries | behind us, who painted | le light spark- | ling landscapes that were as vividly real- | istic as those of the most ardent impres- sionist of the d. and there are some | Pompeiian wall decorations that might have been signed by Puvisde Chavannes | —gray, flat surfaces, with delicate figures in pale harmonies of color. Were they to be exhi d to-day, with their touches of archaic drawing, connoisseurs would shea tears of joy and the tiresome word *“mod- ernity” would figure in every criucism. | Mr. Watts is not modern. It takes| courage to confess it, and still more to add that it is 2 great renief that heismnot. It 18 rather a vague statement to make, after a confession of ignorance as to what is meant by the term, but it is the one thing to be sureof, Waits is no more modern than Homer. To collect the works of ono artist is to submit them to a crucial test —either his pictures are immeasurably improved by the contact with each other or they be- come 1nexpressibly monotonous. It oce curred to me to wonder whether any Jiving artist could stand the test so well. Imagine the suicidal effect of seeing fifty Alma Tademas in one collection, fifty rose-wreathed Roman maidens in fifty pomnpously decorated marole interiors, Pass even into tbe correct and chill at- mosphere exhaled by the pictures of the great draughtsman, Sir Frederick Leigh- | ton, at present exhibited at the Royal | Academy, and note the contrast. In | some of the technical questions Sir Fred- | erick is pasily the master, but his great, admirably composed pictures are lifeless | and flat compared to the calm, tull-|shot Asa rule the slungshot is sacred to | shadows modeling the features. The color | Eréat Venetians. blooded, magnificently alive conceptions | at the new gallery. | It is only after seeing these three great | rooms full of pictures; after seeing the | George Frederick Watts of the British Royal Academy, and the Art Lesson to Be Learned at His Studio in the fact of bis immediate recognition of | not all sublimely buman and nearly all | the force of his technique and its Inmita- | inevitably tragic. In that, perbaps, they | tions. He was never tempted into futile | are modern; the gods know no Welt- experiments outside of his own fields of | schmerz. labor. There are greater araughtsmen | ltis with a curious feeling of disappoint- and greater painters, but few greater art- | ment that we look around the first room ists—for he has been abie to carry out his | and see only portraits and a few large al- intentions and has given his ideas a form | legorical subjects. At the first giance the so noble that it is impossible to quarrel | portraits seem to have a very great simi- with details. There is only one instance | larity; the lighting is almostinvariably the of a giant having been slain with a slung- | same—a simple studio light with sharp i | savage small boys and critics with an equally savage and destructive ideal. If Watts' technique, as such, is not in any way remarkable it is always ample in the head is generally full and rich, the | whites subdued with glares of green and wn, the backgrounds and coats painted | apparently sith a very large brush, full of | | struggle or haste! | 1818, ne began his career at the Royal | among the great | preponderating | marbles his first pictures should nave Little Holland House Gradually we lose the first impression of monotony, the portraits hav: as much similarity, one to the other, as living beings bave, neither more norless. They are not | all equaily agreeable in color, but they ail | simply and with the utmost force be 1e- nores everything that may attract the at- tention. In the picture of Hope seated on the ball of vapor that represents the world, a little shining fizure in blua, with bave tbat vital quality in a portrait—cbar- jea brilliant little head that seems to absorb acter. And whata collection of the mas- ter minds of the century, the poets, the | historians, the statesmen! Alfred Ten- nyson, in youth and in age; Robert Browning and Matthew Arnold, Swin- burne and William Morns, Carlyle and | John Stuart Mill, Motley and Cardinal | Manning, Gladstone and Dilke and the | Duke of Argyll, Rossetti and Burne Jones and Guizot and Joachim the violinist, and so on throngh a long list of famous names. His sketch for a portrait is drawn with black and yellow ocher and a dirty white that is almost dry. Then he models with his dry color, so thas it looks as though | he kad put it on with a trowel and a rake, and finally come the thin colors, vermil- lions and light reds and even burnt sienna and glazes of greens and blues. | He has had exceptional opportunities. An artist, who, from his earliest youth, | has lived only for his art; who has been free to live for 1t, without considerations for the opinioas, prejud ces of his time, | without the terrible compeiling necessity of using his talent as a means to an end, | no wonder his work bears mo sign of | The brutal god man- mon which be depicts with such frightful reality has only for him the terrors of the imagination. Born in London in Academy, but soon left 1t, dissatisfied, to | pass his days in the British Museum sculptures from the It is curious that with the influence of the Elgin Parthenon. been painted very delicately, with anx- ious and almost painful finish. In 1843 he competed for the prize for a dscora- tion for the houses of Parliament, and, winning it, he departed at once for Italy. It was but a step from Phidias to the There are sketches in the studio at Lit- le Holland House that might have been jgned by Tintoretto, so animated is the movement of the figures, so rich and vivid the light, we have beautiful painting, so as to show that if he does not always use this instrument it is not because he can- not. In that eventful trip to Italy, especially they were not painted for the ponderous gold frames df a modern exhibition, but for a setting and a space infinitely larger. The sketches for the pictures *Chaos,” “The Creation,”’ *The Temptation,” “The Death of Abel’’ are conceived in the Italian spirit. The well-known and most beautiful compositions, *‘Orpheus” and “Eurydice,”” are far finer in the small than in the larger canvas, where botn figures are lifesize; and who has not been 1im- Portra of LADY LinDsAY. in that city of dreams, Venice, he gradu- pressed with the ally arrived at the conciusions in regard to his work from which he has never de- parted. At 25 he made colossal plans for his future, and at 75 he is still steadily painter’s studio at Little Holland House, | and satisfying. He is neither a miser nor full of sketches snd studies for porfraits, |a spendtnriit; there is never a touch of that any correct idesa of man has accomplished in one lifetime | ity. may be arrived at. 1t becomes more and more evident that | and Hope and Life and Faith, might be It has one unusual quality—its abso- the secretof his wonderful power iiesin | Greek gods and goddesses, if they were | indescribable depth and beauty. whac this one | bravado; there is never a note of insincer- | | 1ute serenity; these Titanic fi ures, Death | an indefinite grayish brown color. The the color. engaged in fulfilling them, with unim- productions of the majestic “Love and Death” or the “Love and Life,” which an insane committee at Washington refused to accept as a gift! Waits has never sold a picture—he has rarely painted a portrait to order. His large pictures, as a whole, seem to run to| In the sketches we feel the painter, bronze-brown and silvery white figures, | carried away with the actual surface | with the occasional use ¢f deep and radi- | beauty of the pigments as they mingle ant blue that gives to the smallest pic- | and separate and tremble and shine on | tures of Tintoretto and Veronese a certain | his brush. In the large pictures the idea | is the central point, and to express it most paired freshness and enthusiasm and a vigor that a youth might envy. He life, as an artist, has been almost unique in its dependence, its calm and lofty re- wished to make a series of frescoes repre- | serve. His marriage with Elien Terry senting the history of the world, and his | lasted but a few years; he was unwilling smallest pictures have always preserved | to sacrifice his quiet and retired mode of the decorative quality. Unconsciously | living to the whirl of social engagements ASTERS which had become virtnaily a necessit; and they separated by mutual consent. Like the old masters, there is hardly a branch of art in which Watts has not conquered ‘a position for himself. His bust of Clytie is as. fine and vigorous as bis paintings; his landscapas have un- usual interest and originality. In the landscape, “Tne First Day After the Del- uge,” there is a Turner-like effect of ses and mist, with clouds t at are blown away from the great ball of fire that floods the picture with liquid gold. His way of working is one not easi described. The drawing done n{tetr :n':l-}; attempts the color sketch comes next—a small canvas that actually palpitates with energetic strokes of the loaded brush. Then & larger sketch that for completeness leaves very little to be desired, ana then at last the colossal decorations, which may be worked over for years. There is one in which each sketch grows more im- pressive, and the largest is a decoration that holds you with an intensity of inter- est that is almost poignant. It is called “The Rider on the White Horse.” The catalogue gives the lines from Revaelation, “And Isaw, and behold a white horse, and he that sat on him had a bow and a crown was given unto him, and he went forth conquering and to conquer.” That noble knight might be the young Prince Buddha riding out from his white castle gate, and with all the sin and_hunger and misery of the world breaking in upon his vision; around the white steed are clutch- ing hands and heads with straining eyes and a terrible fear is upon them, and the face of the knight is pale with grief and infinite pity, The art of the Italians was a sensuous art; nothing of the gayety of it has been carried into the work of their nineteenth century disciple. Mr. Watts’' art is in- tellectual. Heis a philosopher, a poet and a dreamer, and his painting1s a vehicle for his ideas, of which he has enough and to spare for a whole generation of youth- ful artists, who shrug their shoulders and speak of ‘the “province of literature.”” To use Mr. Watts’ own words, “The great majority of these works must be regarded rather as hieroglyphs than anything else; certainly not as more than symbols, which all art was in the beginning.” In tbis nineteenth century, so soon drawing to a close, there are few mors dis- tinguished figures than that of this tire- less enthusiast, working for the sake of the labor itself, who ‘“‘went forth con- quering and to conquer.” Vax Dyck Brows. London, Jan, 23, 1897. Excellent results have recently been ob- tained by the use of electricity for bleach- ing paper, SGIENGE WILL NOW WATGH FOR EARTHQUAKES ALL OVER THE WORLD =™vROFESSOR JOHN MILNE, the &J)) eminent seismologist, has set afoot N\ a project to establish earthquake station over the world. Here is the first news of this important movement. Professor Milne bas for years been the greatest earthquake authority in the world, He has devoted- his life to the | study of them, and wherever earthquakes | are common his name is known. He can | tell you when the earth is quaking in Peru and predicts the occurrences of them in the Orient sometimes days ahesd. He bas invented machines which show just how the earth moves at such times and the effect on every variety of structures. Scientific results of great moment are expected of Professor Miine's plan when it becomes operative. Commercially it is | of the greatest importance. For the first time, it now seems probable, will accurate, relisble and vaiuable observations of | seismic shocks, pulsations and earth | tltings be properly recorded. They will also be preserved and so promptly trans- mitted from the scenes of the seismic menifestations that the news may serve eisewnere as & warnipg of possible im- pending danger, Such news thus promtly furnished will also greatly en- hance the value of relief measures for earthquake sufferers, Professor Milne is the most distin- guished of modern scientists who have de- voted much time to the study of earth- quakes and their apparent causes. His book, “‘Earthquakes,” is accepted as an suthority. While mach literature is ex- tant, extending back to the ancients, which contains a vast amount of inci- hquake lore, Professor Milne ly waved aside some of the fanci- ful theories of tue speculators. Recogniz- ing the value of hard facts properly gath- ered, he seeks to have the civilized Gov- ernments, commercial interests and scien- tists combine in securing data which cannot fail to prove of inestimabie benefit. Professor Milne has especially studied seismology 1n Japsn, and more lightin recent years has probably been thrown upon earthquakes from tnat volcanic and progressive land of a mnew civilization than from any one or several other sources. The maritime interests are naturally as much concerned and interested in this scientific profect of the scientist as any otber. The merchant marine and even the navies of the world have suffered from the tidal waves which have been sequences of earthquakes or at least connected with their causes in the mindsof thinking men. Civilized Governments expend enor- mous sums charting the currents, reefs and obsiruction to clear navigation in their ocean and inland waters, and gener- ously provide for astronomical and met- eorological observaiions and records. The aggregate cost required for Professor Milne's entire plan is so infinitely small compared with that sum which is ex- pended by private enterprises on astron- omy alone that there is small doubt that his hopes will speedily be fully realized, The modern necromancer of science, electricity, will play a strong secondary part in this scheme 1o keep a constant survey of the earth’s suriace for signs of approaching shocks. In his argument for the adoption of his plan Professor Milne includes the interesting element of en- abling newspapers to be assured of the veracity of news of earthquakes as far away perbaps as in the antipodes. On July 6 and September 8, 1896, ac- counts of earihquakes in Kobe were pub- lished in the London newspapers. These earthquakes originated in Japan, but were recorded sixteen minutes later in the Isle of Wight. Itwas proved in one of these rccords that there hau been an error in lelegiaphic transmission to the news- papers of two days. Another record gave an accurate account of the catastrophe, the details of which were not known until the arrival of correspondence in the mails three weeks later. The seismographs in the observatory Professor John Milne, the Eminent Seismologist, Organizing an Earthquake Survey of the Globe--Important Results Are Gertain---Valuable Warnings Will Be Given on the Isle of Wight sometimes have not | stations will be allotted to the North | Portland, Or. The City of Mexico and, | to first news of this character proved the earthquake stories to be purely imaginary | when there may be peace in Cuba, Ha- orbased on earth tremors too infinitesi- | vana are both probable points. The quakes. Mr. Dunn states that he haslong | recorded anything, although the cables | American continent Professor Milne | bankered after aseismoeraph and respect- | and the wires have vouched for bricf ac- | bas not specifically stated. It is | fully and earnestly endeavored to get the | counts which were double-leaded and | probable that the United States will |department at Washington to endow his | capped with big head-lines by cable ed- | embrace within its bouniaries at|elaborate scientific plant with this inter- | itors of newspapers, of earthquakes in the | least half a dozen. Likely points|esting seismometric addition. The hien | East. Recolleciion of such episodes have | are Washington, D. C.; New York City, | officials at Washington coldly responded | tempted Briuish journalists to at the | St. Louis, Mo.; New Orleans, La.; Gal- | that New Yorkers did not have earth- | seismographs. Subsequent information | veston, Tex.; San Franc! . and | quakes enough to bother with and indif- | ferently declined to provide him and them with the coveted seismograph. As an observer of meteoroiogical phases | and Milne in his recognition of the importance of anticipating, confirming and correctinz such telegraphic news. The records of the Weather Bureau of this city bear few traces ot any disturb- ance properly chargeabie to seismic origin, then mostly manifestations, excenting the real shock of about ten years ago which affected the | Atlantic coast and expended its fury on the devoted southern city of Charleston, S.C. Ifthe New York Weatter Bureau il ’l‘ 212 THE DELICATE mal to be worthy the steel of the ob- serving scientists, and that they were probably unnoticed by more than one man out of a hundred. In one such instance particularly—a re- cently reported disaster in Kobe — the telegraphic reports greatly exaggeratea the seismic effects regardless of the alarm inspired in the mind of the many Enulisn people who had relatives or iriends in the districts affected. How many earthquake observation United.States signal service headquarters at Washington boasts a seismograph, and there is one in the Lick Observatory of Calitornia, which is not, however, offi- cially in commission. Yorecaster Elias Dunn of the United States Weather Bureau in New York City says that he is willing o add to his duties as advanceagent of the meteorological con- tinuous performance weather show, which New Yorkers never lose interest in, the function of dealing out tips on earth- and phenomena Mr. Dunn appreciates the vaiue which observatories of seismic dis- turbances would have for the student or the savant like Professor Milne, who is trying to evolve every possible fact asa factor in the construction of a science which will eventually make seismology rank high. To ours as to Great Britain's merchant marine accurate news and in- formation of seismic disturbsnces wo ld be highly valued and appreciated. Mr. Dunn says he fully concurs with Professor e ) + sy A | i ‘I SEISMOGRAPH RECORDING A TREMOR IN AN EARTHQUAKE STATION. had been equipped with the proper seis- mologic outfit its memoranda of puny earthquakes might have been more num- erous. The:e considered with the records made at other points might have con- tributed to tne final solution of the old question: ‘“‘What makes the earth quake ?” It is not the intention of Profemsor Milne and the scientists, capitalists hav- ing internaiional commercial interests, and Government officials whom he bas in- terested 1n his project, to go to the ex. refer .t0 unimportant | pense of erecting new structures for ob- servations. This is not regarded as neces- sary. At most or all of the important points w1 ere observatories are desirable, observatories equipped and manned al- ready exist, and all that is requisite is to install sei-mographs and' to instruct the observers in their proper use. It is intended that the records thus made shall be given the widest publicity and shall be made accessible to all in- quirers. Besides being of more practical | use, they Lelp to educate the students of | physics and also interest and eniighten the merely curious. With s slight smile Mr. Dunn remarked apropos of one important phase of earth- quake observation: “When we get our seismograph, [ suppose on Sundays, Mon- days, holidays and other days when news items are scarce, the city editor will as- sign a man to come and see if the teismo- graph bas not recorded an earth tremor. It is not improbable that we will have such records oftener than might be sup- posed, because various causes occasionally eufficiently disturb the seemingly solid surface of this land we live in to makea record on an instrument so delicately ad- justed as a seismograph.” Local causes often account for move- ments of the earta palpable enough to startle people and terrify the ignorant and superstitious. Explosions, landslides and other sudden concussions might slightiy affect a seismograph. In 1808 there was a landsiide at Rossberg, Switzerland, which occasioned a local quaking of the ground. Volger Mohr and other writerson sei mology have suggested that some of the small earthquakes which have been felt in Germany might be traced to the caving in of the roofs of enormous subterranean cavities gradually hollowed out by the solvent action of water on deposits of rock- salt, gy psum and limestone. The installation of a seismograph would doubtless, on general principles, be as welcome to other observers as it would to Mr. Dunn. The definite purposs of Pro- fessor Miltie now is, however, to deter- mine the velocity with which motion is communicated from an origin through our earth to its antipodes and to other points upon its surface. From such de- terminations of speed, which are appar- ently higher than we should get were our world a ball of steel or glass, new light would also be thrown upon its effective rigidity, a factor of importance in many investigations. The Trans-Oceanic and several subma- rine cable companies wiil nave a very practical reason to be interested in the work of the new earthquake survey, Sub- marine disturbances have often resnlted in the disarrangement, breakine and even virtual destruction of cables. It is confi- dently asserted that the survey would localize the origin of the disturbances, while at the same time light would by thrown upon changes which are continu- ously in overation upon the steeper slopes of ocean beds. The seismometers, with their recording apparatus to be used in the big earthquake survey, will bave all the latest implove. ments. These instruments will no e all the other movements besides great sud. den displacements which recent obserya. tions have shown are characteristic of earthquakes. The movemenis classed s earthquakes resemble real earthquakes in the rapidity with which they occur, but differ from earthquakes in being imper. ceptible until de.ected by instrumental means. Another ¢ of movements designated as “earth tiltings” are manifested by a slow bending and unbend ng of the aur. fave. Measurements of these movements therefore differ. The thing measured in ordinary earthquakes and earth tremors is the displacement of a point in the earth’s crust. In the application of measuring instruments to slow “tilting” the thing measured 1s any change in the plane of the earth’s surface relatively to the ver- tical. It is prcbable, therefore, that Professor Milne’s plan includes the use of two seis- mographs. The one following what is termed the inertia method will be an im- proved duplex pendulum seismograph. This instrament draws a horizontal plan of the path pursned during an earthquake by a point of the earth’s suriace. It, how- ever, takes no note of the displascement of time, an element that must be considered in estimating the violence of an earth- quake from the record. In order to ascertain the elapsed time ot the passing of the earthquake the whole movement is resolved into rectilinear com- ponents and these are separately recorded on s continuously moving plate drum. The point of the indicator draws an undu- lating line, from which the number, suc- cession, amplitude, velocity and accelera- tion of the component movements can be deduced and the resultant motion deter- mined. Of this class of instruments is this horizontal pendulum seismograph which has been used to record Japanese earthquakes for the past sixteen years. To measure earth tremors an instrument still more complicated and delicate than those briefly referred to is desirable. Sey- eral bearing such names as *‘micro- seismoscope” or ‘microseismometer” have been invented. Tue desideratum in this line of scientific invention has been to find a mode of suspension which is atonce astatic, or superior to the influence of the earth’s magnetism, and as nearly friction- less as is possible. The crossed-line sus- vension device as readily realizes this as anything that has been devised up to date. This microseismometer consists of two bobs separately suspended at right angles to each other, one above the other, ina cast-iron case. To the top of the case is fixed a microscope. Its micromometer eyepieco is focused on a hair stretched transversely across a vertical tube in the upper bob, This measures horizontal motion in the plane of the drawin the lower bob, which carries a similar transverse bair. A lens which is fixed between the bobs reveals an image of the lower hair in the plane of the upper hair, so that both appear crossed in the micro- scope. Both components of horizontal motion can thus be observed together. It is in Professor Milne's scheme to have a central earthquake station in Eng- land. It may be either located on the Isle of Wight or at Greenwich. This central station would have insiruments to record not only the slower pulsatory motions of the ground, but also to re:ister the more rapid vibrations. To obtain a complete record of some earthquakes a minor record is required of the premonitory symptoms culminating in its birth, the magnitude and frequency of the vibrations constitut- ing its lite, and the spasmodic tremblings which are sequent upon the relief of the seismic strain. The aggregate of the sums annually spent by civilized nations upon the obser- vation of movements in the heavens, in the atmosphere and upon_inland and ocean waters is enormous. While all this Iabor, study and expense g0es OR We our- selves and the supposititiously stationary locations of the instruments used to record such changes are freguently moved back and forth—in some parts of the world altogether for hours—during every year. ‘The peovle of the TUnited States, especially those on the lower Pacific coast region, where earth movements are frequent, and the inhabitants of the~ Carolinas, with whom their realistic earthquake is still a Jiving, sad and serious memory, will warch with interest for the installation of Pro- fessor Milne's system and his seismo- graphs, Motion at right angles to this is shown by‘ 4 }