San Marcos free press. [volume] (San Marcos, Tex.) 1877-1892, 1883-02-15
THE STORY OF A STATUE.

There is a story attached to the
monument which covers the ashes OF
Marco Bozzaris, at Missolonghi-the
Greek girl half reclining on the tomb
and tracing. with her finger the name
of the hero.
DavidIof Anglers was the artist. 1t
was at the period when the heroic
struggle of Greece for her liberty fired
the hearts of all the gentle and enthu-
siastic of Western Europe that that
sculptor resolved to erect over the ash
es Of Bozzaris worthy monument.
As one day he was lettering in the
cemetery, his eye fell upon a staange
picture-a girl, almost child, kneel-
ing upon a tomb and spelling out let
ter by letter, tracing each with her
finger, the inscription on the stone.
Il have the composition" said the
artist to himself, now for the model.
He found the model one day as he
and Victor Hugo were walking down
Rue du Montpanasse-a ragged girl OF
IA, slight, frail, but with a face and
figure of classic beauty-a waif OF the
streets picked up by an old woman,
who sold fried potatoes at the street
corner and sent out her protege to pose
in the studios.
The girl.. visited David's atelia, Rue
de Fleurus, frequently, sometimes &C
companied by her mother. On the
wall there hung a medallion head of
Christ in bronze, mounted on velvet
andlset off by handsome gilt frame,
on which the old woman Icast an ad-
miring eye.
One day as'at the conclusion of her
hour the child was drawing on her
tatteredl clothing, It.she tsaid to the
artist
"That Christ yonder, M. David my
mother often speaks about it. If you
wished to let us have. .it.in our attic it
would be sol grand! And it would
console me-uphold me-strengthen
me, perhaps. Could I have it? If 1
could l would pay you little by little as
your model for as many statues as
you liked"
David took down the medallion and
gave it to the child.
you really want it?" he said.
Here it is, and whenever you are
tempted to go astray-to do wrong
fix your eye upon it. And do not for
get the artist who made it, and who
gives it to you,your own, for nothing"
In one of his curious fragments,
"Une Mutt d'Atelier," David records
his passion for this creation of his
chisel-paternal, not amorous. like
that of Pygmalion.
Behold! at last it is finished" he
wrote; thou, my dear child, must
leave our France for that fair land of
Greece. l have so loved thee, as Il
tender father loves his child, in spite
of the faults he knows so well. Soon
shalt thou quit our country of noble
inspirations and great works for that
in which all these had their germ and
beginning. The sun of Attica, not
our pale sun, shall warm thee with its
glow; and when the night star rises
in the blue, like thought of the Lord,
one ray will fall upon thy melancholy
brow, for thou art very sad, my child,
my poor child!
The statue was sent to MiSsolonghi |
and in new labors the artist forgot it
OF, at least, ceased TO remember its |
model, the half starved child of the |
Rue de Montpanasse.
V.
One night some time afterwards as
David was passing along the Rue
de Childebert he was attacked from
behind by an assailant, who struck
him down, laying his head open with
two blows that well nigh proved fatal.
The would-be assassin was never
known, though the artist had good
reason to suspect that it was another
sculptor, a man provoked by David's
having voted for a nval in a pine
competition and subject to fits of pos
tive insanity.
Some years later when he had ceased
to think Of the attempt on his life,
David, always an ardent Republican,
received q note bidding him be, be-
ween midnight and I o'clock NJ a