Raftsman's journal. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1854-1948, 1860-04-25
ART AND LIQUOR IN EUROPE.

friend, will repay the reader for its perusal -
sit is curious to study the institutions of Rome,
and see how man decays here with such Govern
ment. The people of the Roman States-about
| three and quarter millions-have one of the fl
nest climates and countries in the world. See
what they make of it. They have about % or 80
miles of railroad-one track to Frascat another
| to Ciyita Vecchia-though other lines laid out
The commerce is inconsiderable; manufactures al
| most nothing. All the spinning and weaving in
| Rome is done by hand so is all the saving. Ag
riculture returns to the rudest form. In all the
fertile campagna about Rome they get but one
| crop of grain from the land in three years; the
rest of the time it lies fallow The favorite work
of agriculture once was to produce the vine, the
olive, the fig, nuts, and various grains. Now the
farmer seeks chiefly the spontaneous product of
| the soil-grass-and ON that he pastures his oxen
sheep, and swine. The labored products of the
farm on the decline. Rome exports about one
million pounds of wool year / think it is her
| chief export, and may be worth two or three mil
lion dollars. In the city the chief industry, after
supplying the daily wants of the back and belly,
is devoted to the fine arts. find that last year
Rome sold old pictures to the amount of $4,000,
and new ones to S134, ,000-say Sl50,000 for pic
lures. She sold $4,000 worth of old sculpture, and
S230,000 worth of new. Then she exports cameos
mosaics, jewels, church ornaments &c, to about
S5G0,00o year. Perhaps might say her in
dustry in the fine arts brought her in 81 900 in
rious, and depends the number of strangers
here. 1t is hard time the poor artists have this
year when there are SO few foreigners in town 1t
curious to the contrasts of nceness and rude
| ness in the street. In studio men make
statues of most exquisite grace and beauty-the
| triumph of mind over matter; in shop next door
others make the strong boxes to hold those statues
| they put log of wood on two clumsy horses, one
man gets on top, another underneath, and with a
miserable old saw they cut the log into panks to
make the box. (We don't make many statues in
Boston, but top sawyer is not known The ell
! egant arts held in high esteem, while the use
full sink into neglect 1t is curious to see how long
| 1T takes mankind to respect the industry which
feeds and clothes houses and comforts, the human
| The work of ruling. of fighting, of fsSayIng
| the soul" by some sort of hocus pocus-this is
| thought decent and respectable; but farm work.
wood work, shop work, that is mean and debasng
Such is the notion that prevails in the classic wri-
| ters of Greece and Rome, and with the 'gentle-
| men" and ''ladies" of New England to-day-I
mean with the ornamental males and females.
Slavery is only supported by the profound con-
| tempt for productive industry which marks the
South; and it has its support at the North chiefly
| in the same contempt. Miss de-de-diddle is
descended from blacksmith at Beverly Mar
behead he was grandfather to this foolish thing;
| she is ashamed of her origin, and never an
| anvil without blush of mortified vanity. Now.
if had son. 1 should rather he would be great
| engineer. great mason, carpenter or railroad
| builder than great painter, sculptor or fiddler;
| and certainly should rather my were or
dInary third-rate tailor, shoemaker, or brazier,
than an ordinary thrd-rate sculptor, to spoil mar
| bic and waste the time of men he strove to make
statues of. How much better to be common
house painter than stupid dauber of canvass. In
America-I mean in the free States-the mass of
the people, in their collective action work right
in respect to this, though uncounted individuals
make the greatest mistakes but here it is the
community as whole that falls into the error.
Alas for them the miserable rags which the
clothing OF the people, and the wreched food they
eat are consequences of the fatal bunder, and the
haggard, melancholy faces of the common people, |
i'll housed, ill Clad i'll fed, the protest of
ture against the worship of beauty and the scorn
OF use. Think of a city exporting million dol
lars worth of trinkets, while she has not saw
mill nor power loom. We manage this matter |
better in New England. There paper
mills in Massachusetts,, foundry at Saugus, and
saw-mills more than can recollect, before pic
ture had ever been painted in all New England,
or a statue made. Jonathan had many a useful
notion before he made him fiddle.
In Europe you many things which seem
strange to an American. Take the use of wine.
If am right the Europeans consume about ,500,
100000 gallons of wine. In France. leaving out
OF account the pasture land which is not farmed
and the forests, of the actual arabic land third
is devoted to the grape Yet there are immense
districts where no wine be raised at all. see
1T stated that the government returns make it ap
pear that the people of France drink $50 900 900
gallons of wine, and the calculation is that the a
mount is not much less than 1000, 100000 Yet
don believe In the year 1852 there was so much
drunkenness among the thirty nine million peo- |
pie of France among the three million Yankees
of New England I have been four months at
Rome. There are wine shops everywhere. 1 am
outdoors from three to six hours day. and have
not yet seen man drunk and then one is |
merry, never Intoxicated. The Romans, Italians,
French, &c. are quite temperate; they drink their
weak wine with water, and when they take liquors,
1T is only little glassful at time, (Which does
not contain spoonfu) don't believe there is |
bar in all Italy where men step up and drink |
rum and water, gin and water, &c. Excessive
drinking is not to the taste of the people. In the
north of Europe, and even in Switzerland, it is not
so. The English. without help from the Irish and |
Scotch, drink about 600 10000 900 gallons of
beer every year, not to speak of the wine, spirits
&C., they take to wash it down withal. There is |
drunkenness. So you find it in Scandinavia, in |
Holland, and North Germany. How do you think |
the Americans will settle the drink question |
Certainly not by taking merely to water, tea cof-
fee, &c. We shall have more beer perhaps, re- |
turn to the making of cider, and certainly plant |
vines where they will grow. Drunkenness is such |
anything to get rid of it. But sometimes think
we have taken the wrong track glad to see |
the License law introduced to The New York Legis-
lature, and think it will do more good than our /
New England scheme of prohibition by force.
Just now, the two prominent nations of Europe |
are doing great work-introducing liberal |
scheme of commercial intercourse. Really, Napo-
leon the Little, used ontemptuousiy to call
him. seems to be the most statesmanlike head In
Europe and is far wiser than the other Napoleon,
who broke wickedly with the ideas of the age,
and so properly set down the little rock at the
end OF the world to point the moral OF history and
adorn its tale dislike much that Napoleon has
done, but must confess honest admiration for
his efforts to liberate Italy, and to advance the in
dustrial interests of France After all, it is prob
ably true that his nation deserves no better rule
than he gives it, and is not capable of liber
al institutions. Those Celtic people have got e.
quality; the old aristocratc regime is perished ut
terly; all depends universal suffrage; liberty
is something they care little about. A strange
people are the French, with much military cour-
age and no civil courage at all. don't see how
they could live under republican government
one like ours, am sure would be impossible.
If you would succeed in Iife attend well to your
own business-and let that of others alone.