Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-05-22
A SCULPTOR'S REMORSE
SHATTERED HIS MASTERPIECE
OVER WIFE'S SUICIDE.

With his wife lying cold as marble, a
suicide by poison, Robert T. Paine. the
noted sculptor, protege of Augustus st.
Gaudens last night, mallet in hand, quietly
entered the studio in his home, which Is
built upon the brow of the Palisades, New
York, and with a giants strength, urged
on by supreme grief and halted ambition,
shattered into fragments his masterpiece
and life work-a heroic model In clay Of
Neptune and his mermaids.
Today the sculptor, broken in spirit, with
his four little girls will follow his dead
wife to their former home in Valparaiso,
Ind, with the announced intention of for
saking his art and starting life anew In
some other occupation.
The self-inflicted death of Mrs. Beatrice
Paine, gifted as painter and writer. a
woman of charming personality, the idol
lied of her husband and four beautiful chill
dren, proved the tragic elimination of ten
years of unrequited effort and endeavor by
her sculptor husband in New York. A suf-
ferer from insomnia and Respondent over the
strange uses of adversely, Mrs Paine swal-
lowed carbolic acid yesterday afternoon
while her husband was gone to procure
medicine. When he reached home he found
his wife, surrounded by her weeping daugh-
ters dying. He summoned two physicians,
but she was dead when they arrived. Be-
fore taking the poison Mrs, Paine had Sc
cured pencil from her mother-in-law but
no note Of farewell has been found.
Broken Hopes and Ideals.
In the grief that reigned in the big Gre
clan home of the sculptor built like a
Rhenish castle and fashioned out of huge
blocks Of cement by the personal endeavor
Of Paine, the distracted husband laid wax
over the icy features Of his wife, and with
unerring skill produced her death mask.
Then, still wearing his apron and just
come from his work Of love, he talked of
his broken hopes and ideals. Paine Is
man of giant stature, black-haired, dark
eyed, with the sinuous hands of a worker in
clay and marble. He silently led his ques-
toner into the huge studio, whose walls
are fifty feet high, whose ceiling is stained
glass, the view from whose windows ex-
tends straight down the Palisades for 300
feet and up and down and across the Hud-
son river for miles.
Look" he said, pointing to huge model
In French clay of Neptune and his mer-
maids his chariot, horses and three
pronged trident, superbly executed, bearing
in every line and curve the stamp of ge-
MUS. This is my life work. OF what use
is it now! I have spent the ten best years
of my life in creating what you see and 1t
still remains unfinished. 1t never will be
finished, for I shall destroy 1t tonight"
Called Model His Ideal.
at have called this model My IDEAL 1t
was to have proven to the world that the
art of expression in the marble remains to
the younger generation of American scup-
tors.
But I can work no more. My ambition
is dead for my inspiration and my life has
gone from me. My art perishes with the
death Of my beloved wife.
ALIAS, poor Noqueti 1 now know, too,
that when the helping hand is gone the in
spiration and the light of artistic achieve
ment Is lost forever. 1t was well that.No
quet died as he did. He had been unappre-
ciated despite his genius.
Merit has no appreciation in New York.
continued the sculptor fiercely, as he gazed
at the marvellous figure of the enthroned
God of the Waves whose bearded face
doomed twenty-eight feet above the floor.
Ten years ago I started work upon this
model. Five years ago had completed 1t
and asked for public appreciation. 1t was
denied me, and with my mallet I shattered
II into bits.
my wife alone saved me from despair.
Her faith and consistency alone urged me to
persevere. And now my wife Is dead,
victim of the hopeless struggle against pow
erty. Ofttimas we have lived on the verge
OF starvation.
at have made medals and executed sculp-
lures for other men whose regulations are
now secure. What matter IL my ability
went into the expression OF their works.
provided the bread could be provided for
my wife and children? l cared but little
then; care less now.