The record-union., 1897-12-05

At the Plastic Club in Philadelphia
have been exhibited a collection of Jap
anese color prints. The nucleus OF the
exhibition consists of prints owned by
Miss j. L. Southwick of Worcester, but
others contributed by Messrs. Yama-
naka and Takayanaga of Boston ana
many private collections swell the num-
Der to 105 They are woodcuts exc
cuted with the finesse peculiar to Jap
anese art. producing pictorial effect
with. the simplest lines, and combining
rich and mellow tints. Many of them
date from the last century. the Oldest
being by Toru Kiyomasu, 1I1O-116o,
while there are two of Hokusai's cele-
brated views of Fujiyama. The mod
ern color printing in Japan lacks the
richness of tone that characteriZes
these old wood cuts, which are as full
of color as an old Italian painting.
Howard Pyle is engaged upon a set
of illustrations for a holiday edition
"Quo Vads,' some of which have been
already reproduced. They will be found
to be quite different from Mr. Pyle's
previous work. One, for example, rep
reSents Nero at the burning of Rome.
He stands upon the edge of a parapet
covered with tapestries, which fall in
straight folds, and are illumined by the
unseen flames. The figure is boldly
relieved against a background of murky
smoke, while in the middle distance is
a group of awe stricken attendants.
Has the art of writing the gay song,
the chanson, died out in France-the
land of lands for gay songs? Two
years ago died NJ Montariol, leaving
the academy 10000 francs, the interest
of which, besides the income yielded
by small piece of property, was to
be awarded as a prize for a chanson.
As the academy has received no song
which its committee thought worthy of
a prize, ii has returned the property
to Montariol's heirs and annulled the
foundation.
If France no longer makes or un-
makes thrones, she manufactures them
The Emperor Merlelek has ordered a
throne, and it is to be built in Paris.
The frame will be of solid oak with
gold encrusted gewgaws, and draped
with silk In fact, this throne is to
be first class article, and quite as
5oOu O. any bOQy else ) throne.
Marie Corelli has had her portrait
made. :he artist being a Miss Donald
Smith. One might expect that Marie
Coreli would appear as a flashing
dream, dressed in black, with cores of
crimson, but she does not The artist
has given Marie Corelh the guise of
a golden-haired young person, clad in
xy-bf
case. London reporters say people may
now look at Marie Corelli for Just one
shilling" The reason these ungallant
young gentlemen had for poking fun
at the original of the picture was that
the lady had most Indignantly declined
TO have her photograph taken-and vet
the man with the camera can, with his
exceeding skill, construct a fattering
print Any women may to-day be made
lovely. photographically, for the refiec-
tion may become more engaging than
the actual figure
Sir Henry Parkes, the Australian
statesman, counted Carlyle among
the men who had Influenced
him. But his first meeting with
the man of Chelsea did not
promise such things. Parkes began life
as foundry lad in Birmingham, went
out TO Australia. rose to eminence
through his own eXertions, was self
Taught and self made, and in 1861 when
sent to England to lecture in behalf of
emigration to New South Wales, bore
letter TO Carlyle. OF his first inter-
View with Carlyle he wrote in the fol-
lowing year:
don't think understand Carlyle. I
have seen him twice, and had a long
conversation with him each time, or,
more accurately speaking, listened to
long, characteristic utterances from
him. He spoke of the Young Ireland
party, Of O'Connell of English prisons
and prison reformers, of colonization. of
Tennyson and Browning, of Peel. Glad
stone, Bright, and Spurgeon; of Aus
tralian democracy, and a hundred other
things. He sat on the floor and smoked.
and he laughed outright, with a terrible
kind of fullheartedness, at his own
grand sarcasms. But l confess I could
almost as Well explain the meaning of
thunder and lightning as the meaning
of what he said. Still. l was deeply
charmed and am treasuring up an invi-
tation 10 spend another hour with him.
During the second hour Parkes be-
came a convert, and in his later career
as Prime Minister in the Antipodes he
fully realized what Carlyle's writings
had done for him. OF his second hours
interview in Cheyne Row he made this
record:
"On the second occasion he did me
the honor to say he had been thinking
over my defense of the Australian dem
ocratic institutions and that he thought
was right, after all. II would never do
to let the old fogies of officialism direct
the energies OF young country"
Bacchylides' poems the papyrus con-
tanning which was acquired by the Brit
ish Museum last year. are about to be
published, Nearly twice as many lines
have been recovered as was supposed at
first, the total being about 1000. There
are twenty poems or pieces of poems, in
all, SIX being complete. and nine more
substantial fragments being preserved.
Fourteen are in honor of victories in the
Olympic games the rest being paeans.
dithyrambs or hymns, classes of verse
of which there We're hitherto no COM
plete specimens.
Tolstoi has been obliged by the infirm-
tiles of his so years TO give up much of
his literary work. Twice in the last
year he has had light strokes of apo
plexy. He still rides his bicycle, how
ever, and is accompanied on most of his
wheeling trips by one of his daughters
He has been highly pleased recently by
the work of a young man named Conissi.
who is translating Anna Karenina"