The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-07-20

learn now utlle tllttt aanllraDle aFtISt was obtaining for his pictures. Accord lngly the good fellow bought one him self, paying el1,000 for 1t, and let the stupid Rhodians understand that it was his intention to pass off their towns mans work as hls own. Much aston ished, they objected to let the painting be shipped, and Apelles, after strug- gle, ceded his bargain at higher fig ure So Protogenes made his fortune.
 From this story we may suspect that the highest estimate for the masters work at Ephesus is correct-G6 60 000, Pamphilus exacted e220 from all pupils who entered his studio; he it was by whose influence drawing was intro- duced to every school in Greece. Box wood tablets were used by the boys for paper, but we do not learn what was the substitute for pencil. When Mumnldus sacked Corinth he put up the pictures at auction, and King Attalus secured small work by Aristides for
 &130. Mummius was startled at the |price There must be something wrong, he thought, and sent off the mysterious object, carefully packed, to Rome, tell Ing Attalus he had better mind what he was about. Agrippa bought an Ajax" and an "Aphrodite" from the people of Cyzicus, artist unnamed, for ten thousand guineas. Hortensius, the orator, paid G1,400 for picture of the Argonauts by Cydias. King Attalus of- fered Antidotus e13, 800 for a scene from the Odyssey; this sum was refused, and Antidotus gave the work to his native town. Julius Caesar bought an Ajax" and "Medea" from Timomachus for 1000. We have not many notes upon the prices Of sculpture. Polyclatus re- celved G22O00 for the statue of an "ef- feminate youth" The Colossus of Rhodes cost-bronze and all-e e66,000; the great Apollo in the Capitol e111OOO. There was g. famous Roman modeller named Porsis. He accepted a commis- sion from Lucullus for "Felicity''-in
 plaster as 1t seems-at e2,125-did not live to finish it. He charged a Roman knight e22O for the model of krater, a large bowl for mixing wine.
 Pliny gives a few hints upon the value of plate. He is specially indig-
 nant with his contemporaries on this matter, remembering brave days of old, when the Aelian clan had but one silver cup among them, which was a present from the conqueror of Macedonia, and the first bit of precious metal which they or their wives ever owned. Fur
 ther, he relates how long afterwards, a
 man of consular rank, who had tri-
 umphed, was reproved by the censor for possessing five pounds of plate. But | in my time, by Hercules, a provincial knight on campaign, in the most bar barous regions, too, carried with him l twelve thousand pounds of silver" | There were silver couches, silver baths, any, silver floors to the baths, that la- dies of quality might not tread upon the vulgar earth with bare feet. More than one hundred and fifty persons in Rome | had chargers of silver of one hundred pounds weight; a slave of Claudius owned one of five hundred pounds | weight, and eight others to match, each of two hundred and fifty pounds. But persons of taste cared only for the an- tique, the chasing and repousse work of | the great old masters. Mentor was the
 Benvenuto Cellini of those times; simi- | lar, also, in the respect that every piece attributed to him was dubious Pliny says that Mentor only turned out four pairs of vases all of which had perished either in the burning of the capital or | in that of the temple at Ephesus; but there must be an error in the text here | Crassus paid eight hundred guineas for two small cups hys him; for certain oth- CTS he paid forty guineas the pound.
 Most esteemed of all by connoisseurs were articles so worn by time and use that the figures could not be distin- guished. Caius Graechus gave forty guineas per pound for a pair of dol phins Two cups by Zopyrus orna- mented with the triad of 'Orestes fetched one hundred guineas, bowl by Py- theas three hundred and sixty guineas; | it represented Ulysses and Diomedes stealing the Palladium. A lady paid four hundred guineas for a lamp stand,
 and a specially hideous slave was | thrown in"
 | Rhetoric was included among the arts
 of old; let us see how its professors
 were rewarded. Gorgias charged G450
 yearly for instruction. We do not learn
 how many pupils he had, but Chrestus limited his school to hundred; if he
 made the same charge his income from
 this source alone would be e45000 a
 year. It is not impossible. Damianus
 paid Aristldes, the orator, 84000 for a | Slngle i6CLuTeS u UdTDdIidH klUS or the | Chersonese offered Polemon 92500 on | the same terms. He was refused. He-
 rod the younger gave ten horses, ten
 slaves, ten shorthand writers, and more
 than a30,000 cash for lectures to the | famous rhetorician Alexander. It was
 this Alexander who shouted to Antoni-
 nus Plus, in the middle of a speech. Attend to me, Caesar!' Making all
 allowance for Lueiai's extravagant | language we cannot doubt that the
 visible facts he gives relating to con-
 temporaries are true enough And his
 accounts of the luxury in which fash
 ionabIe rhetoricians lived are as aston
 ishlng to us as his bitter descriptions of l the unsuccessful. Adrian drove to his
 'tschooT' in a chariot of silver, the reins
 studded with gems. Polemon never
 showed in public unless attended by an
 army of slaves, led horses, dogs and so ] on. Heracleides, retiring from the pro- | fession, pays e4o,0o0 for a country
 house. It was quite natural. The lstudy of rhetoric was a mania; listening to set speeches the favorite amusement
 of ali classes Those who minister to
 the public taste are always well paid. Y~vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvyv | II ]