The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1890-11-02


were feeling of me and wondering if l
were hollow: ''Come up stairs with me.
Iwant to show you something. Did you
ever go into the work room where wax
figures are made:"
mo"
"Well, take the elevator with me. Otero
will not dance yet for an hour and you
can see the whole business-studio, work
shop, etc.-in that time, and YOU will
enjoy it just as much us you would re-
naming here with that vacant and guile
less look, being constantly taken for
Henry Irving or the deathbed of Ma
poleon."
So | said yes we would CO. l had
never watched the process, and very few
people, as | understood it, were per
mitted to go into the mysterious cham
bers where great men were made and
unmade even quicker than the news
papers could do it. The principal works
wax works, may say, or tableaux
foundry = would seem to be facing
Twenty-third street, one floor above the
entrance. Quite number of people are
busy there ali the time adding new fig
ures and tableaux to the great collection,
in the halls below. Every time mon
arch croaks and a new president is elect
ed the genius of the wax sculptor up
there is called into use, and before you
know it the head of the new republic, in
neat fitting suit of clothes, is inserting
his nice pink hand into the bosom of his
frock coat and trying to look far away,
while people are watching him earnestly
in the great group of potentates.
Twas first introduced to the main wax
worker and artist of the whole estab-
hshment, whose name wish I had Sc
cured, because he was so courteous and
obhging. He showed me all about it,
SO that l could now do it myself if at
any time should decide to retire from
literary pursuits and give myself up en-
tirely to art
The artist of whom l speak makes
heads ana hands and finishes up the lob,
while another artist, whose name did
not get accurately enough to print, IN
less l could at once escape, makes the
bodies. The process is very simple in
deed. Anybody could do it. 1t is as
easy as running paper or perfecting
the tariff so as to be generally agreeable.
The sculptors were working on group
of Christopher Columbus. The artist has
seized upon the happy moment when
Columbus is just about to discover Amer
lea, and he is debating in his own mind
whether or not there is anything in it.
One can see readily by his deep, earnest
look that it is a problem in his brain
which he has not yet settled whether
it will pay him to discover a country
which will introduce the use of plug to-
bacco and freedom.
Columbus was at this time very poor
First he had sought to secure conces-
sion from the legislature of Spain, but
in Spain it costs as much to get Just
appropriation as it does in Albany. He
went on to show that if he did not dis
cover America some one else would, and
that the result would be that some less
deserving and far palmer man would
get his pictures on the American green
backs. But pooh! pooh! said the legisla-
ture, seeing that Columbus had no
means with which to promote legisla-
tive action, and he being plain man,
entirely ignorant of whether bill had
to go to its final passage or over to the
Smithsonian Institution, was guyed and
fooled with by men who should have
known bet r until his money was gone,
and our best Indian tribes were waiting
impatiently all the time to be discov-
cred.
"Alas!" some great chief would say
after vainly searching the horizon, ''an-
other day has went by and my people
remain undiscovered. My great speech
to the pale face, which l have prepared
for the Fourth Reader, is still in manu-
script form. Day after day goes by and
we get no reliable European news. Bahw
He would then eat a light breakfast of
maize, get married, and taking his cross
gun on his shoulder go out and shoot
canvasback muskrat for his luncheon.
Columbus, as he will appear at the Eden
Musee, has dark but pleasant face and
pleasant whiskers. / took his head in my
hand and looked into his steady, gentle
eyes. Also into his vacant head.
The head and face of the figures are
made first in clay, as a sculptor would
do it. 1t is fun. made one. 1t was
pleasing, but the man it resembled 1 had
never met. He was stranger to me.
When the clay is sufficiently hard to use
for that purpose plaster mold is made
from it, in sections, of course, SO that it
may be easily removed; then the melted
flesh colored wax is poured in until it has
attained thickness of from an eighth
to a quarter of an inch, and then it is
allowed to harden. After sufficient time
for this the bust is removed and num-