The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-06-17

to d1late, the marble or bronze Is not merely
a correct transcript of the human form and
face, but it is penetrated and informed with
the soul of humanity.
To comprehend the full measure of Craw-
ford's genius, and TO learn the exact rank he
is entitled to hold as an artist, we must bear
in mind the comparatively early age at which he
died and the fact that his active professional
life extended over little more than twenty
years. This consideration is particularly inn
portant when applied to the art of sculpture,
because of the nature of the materials in
which it works. A painter may shut himself
up in his studio, and with his brushes, paints,
and canvas, all costing but few dollars,
produce work which shall make him immor-
tai; but a sculptor of equal merit must wait
much longer for the opportunity to prove his
power, because of the costliness of his m lte-
rails. The marble or bronze in which great
conception is embodied is so expensive that
untried and unknown hands cannot be trusted
with it.
sculptor must show his passport even
to generous opportunity. He must creep
before he can walk, he must walk before he
can fly. BY works of lower range and infe-
rior scope, he must have given proof of the
ability that is in him, before he can COM
mand the means of the highest success.
Thus it has rarely happened that a
sculptor receives a commission for a
work of the highest class before the
age of thirty-ive, and Crawford laid down the
chisel to die at forty-three. All the sculptors
of modern times with whom he would natu-
rally be compared lived TO an age much be-
yond his. Thorwaldsen died at seventy three,
Canova at sixty-five, Bartolini at seventy-two
Rauch at eighty, Dannecker at eighty-three,
Flaxman at seventy one, Chantrey at fifty-nine,
Gibson at seventy-six, and David at seventy.
There is not one of these eminent artists who
at the age of forty three, had done as much as
Crawford did, taking the amount and the
quality of the work together-not one who, if
he had been called from his earthly labors at
that age, would have left so glorious record
behind. Reasoning from analogy, and in
view of the fact that nearly all the greatest
works in sculpture have been achieved after
the artist had reached the age of forty, is it
too much to say, that had Crawford lived to
the appointed age of threescore and ten, and
gone on as he had been going on he would
have left behind him no equal name ia
modern sculpture
In his industry, in the amount of what he
accomplished, few sculptors can be compared
with him. During his twenty years of pro-
fessional life, he finished upwards of sixty
works, many of them colossal, and left about
fifty sketches in plaster, and designs of vari-
Gus kinds.
From "Three Years as Negro Minstrel" "
we make these extracts descriptive of the in
side life on a Mississippi steamboat:-
In his social relations a performer like
many another great man on woman, is liable
to mistakes of head and heart. The ladies of
the profession are sometimes given to gossip
and backbiting in as great degree at least as
are the gentlemen Jealousy may be as rife
on a Mississippi show-boat as in the ante
chamber of any court in Europe. | have
known a ddRseUSe to furnish boys with clan
destine bouquets to throw on the stage when
she appeared; not that she cared at all for the
praise or blame of the audience, but that she
did care to crush a ceverer rival. l have
known men, whose names have made some
noise in the world, to measure with straws the
comparative sizes of the letters in which they
were announced on poster In our comp my
on board the Palace and the Raymond we hal
strange contrasts in human nature. 1t would
happen, for instance, that the man who
could not sleep without snoring would be
placed in the same state-room with the man
who could not sleep within hearing of the most
distant snore. The man who could not eat
pork was seated at table Just opposite the man
who dotted on it. We had one gentleman
| the tieshy bass singer already mentioned who
| spent all his leisure in catching mockiu9-
birds; and another who passed his spare
| hours in cOntriving new and undiscoverable
| ways of letting these birds escape from the
| cages. There were on board ladies who had
seen more prosperous days, when they wers
| the chief attractions at the theatres of Lon
| don, Paris, and New York, according to their
| own stories; other ladies who had never asso-
ciated with such vulgar people before; other
ladies who hoped they would die, if they did
| not leave the company at the very
next landing but never left; and yet
other ladies, l am rejoiced to add
who were lovely in nature and deed-kind
mothers and faithful wives, whose strength of
| far as possible to restore the social eluili-
| brium.
In the course of the long association
| grotesque friendships sprang up. The man
| who played the bass-drum was the bosom
companion of the man who had charge of the
machine for making the gas which supplied
the two boats The pretty man of the esta-
| blishment, he who played the chimes on the
| top of the museum and the piano in the con-
! cert-room-at present popular composer at
| st. Louis-this young gentleman, who broke
all the hearts of the country girls that came
| into the show, was the inseparable friend of
the pilot-a great, gruff, warm-hearted fellow,
who steered the Raymond from the corners of
his eyes and swore terribly at snags. The man
who busted down Tam O'Shanter and the
Twelve Apostles in wax, and had especial care
of the stuffed birds giratfes, and alligatorS was
on most intimate terms with the cook The
youngest of the ladies who hoped to die if
they didn't go ashore at the next landing and
never went-or died either for that matter
well, she was, or pretended to be, desperately
| in love with the treasurer of the company, a
thin, irascible old fellow, with bald head.
On the arrival of another 6dHS6tS6 III the