Evening journal., 1906-08-04


every other beautiful thing that God has
given US 1t might be the colors OF an
old painting, II might be the gliding on
the carved frame of the old painting, Il
might be Emma Eames' singing Of Mas
senet's "Elegie." or Blanche Rings sing
ing Of The Good Old Summer Time" the
shoulder muscles of Sharkey or the cor
nice Of a Greek Temple. His delight over
/ one was just as keen. as boyish, and
grateful as over all the others. Described
as a "voluptuary." his greatest pleasure
was to stand all day waist deep in the
rapids of a Canadian river and fight it
out with the salmon He always was
brimming with some generous new en-
thusiasm.
"You haven't seen i'll" he would ex-
claim, raising and clenching his two fists.
ITS bully, wonderful, gorgeousi It's ths
finest bit Of his work in America"
To him everything in lfe was bully.
wonderful, gorgeous" His brother artists
testified that he had not a jealous drop
Of blood in his veins. No one knew better
than he what in another mans work was
good, and no one was more quick to say
it was good. OF his own work he was
sincerely modest almost to shyness. If you
emphasized the work as his work and
not the work itself, he would shake him
self like a great bear and turn your re-
mark aside. If the work were good and
beautiful. in his admiration for 1t it did
not matter whether it was his or that
Of an unknown art student. He was al
ways helping these beginners. encourage
ing. advising, finding them commissions,
when he assisted some young man to study
art in Paris no one heard Of 1t, as no one
heard of the girls he aided for the sole
reason that they needed aid. IT, through
/ the girl, any one did hear of it he at
tributed to White the worst motives. Per-
| sonally I know of many cases where he
has helped those who had absolutely no
claim upon him except that they were III
/ and poor. And so far from being the ogre
he has been pictured, when a man or a
woman was in trouble. Stanford White
was the first man in New York to whom
he or she could turn. knowing that ask
ing no questions, preaching no sermon,
1t would give him pleasure to serve them.
Owing to the nature Of his profess
sion he left his mark upon New York
City as few other men have done. The
people Of the whole country know that
as a judge or juror he has chosen for
them public buildings which stand over
all America, and that to him are they
indebted for much of the beauty of the
White City of the Chicago Fair. But
they do not know that nearly every
block Of New York's greatest thor
oughfare is crowded with monuments
to his taste and genius. and that
for the last twenty years there has
hardly been a civic function of public
celebration that has not owed to him
something of its success. 1t was he
who at the time of the Columbus cele-
bration lined Fifth avenue with Vene-
tian masts and filed the trees of Madi-
son Square with orange-colored lamps
under which the people wandered as
though in fairy garden Of their own;
1t was he who was chosen to decorate
the Metropolitan Opera House with fif-
teen thousand roses; Il was he who
built the Madison Square Garden, the
new Tiffany building. the homes of the
Players. the Century, the Lambs. The
Brook, and the lofty marble arch tc
Washington which fronts Fifth ave-
nue.. The covers you have known fol
/ the longest time on the magazines are
his, and the same hand that made the
! plans for the Metropolitan Club, the
{ home Of the "millionaires," drew the
design for the pedestal of the Farra'
gut statue, on which the homeless take
their ease. In New York 1t is impos
sible for the poor man, the rich man
the man Of taste and the man witt
none, to walk abroad without beins
, indebted to Stanford White for some
thing that is good and uplifting. Il
it then intelligent to believe that on'
whose work was fine, big and far
reaching could himself have been de
! graded and contemplate?
The misfortune was that Stanfor'