The Ely miner., 1909-12-31

daily roll for the old gentleman.
And if after reading this any one
can see through me it proves what /
started out to prove-that I'm invis-
ible.
a CERTAIN enormously wealthy
u u parvenu, who thought he had a
love for art, but who bought by name
and fame only, expended $4,000 for
which he secured five small, but fine,
examples of the Barbizon school. And
as soon as the French pictures were
hung in his drawing-room there ap-
peared to him out of the everywhere
a man who said:
You have five magnificent paint
ings for which you paid magnificent
prices. 1t will doubtless console the
painters, who are wandering in Shad-
owland, to know that the work that
would hardly buy them bread when
they were upon earth will now keep
an art dealer in plenty for lifetime.
But why have you not bought beau.
tiful American pictures? You are not
French. 1t is true that art has no
nationality, but you should foster the
art of the men who live under the
same flag as you, even as you profess
to protect the interests of your work
ingmen."
And the Parvenu said: 81 am an
American Of the Americans and be-
lieve in American engines and Ameri-
can pluck and American brains, but
those French make business of art,
and am told that American artists
are merely imitators."
Fool" said the ghostly visitor.
Look"
And vision appeared before the
parvenu and he saw a lover of art
clad in the peculiar fashion of so
years hence. And he was buying five
small American pictures, for which he
willingly paid $4,000.
And when the parvenu saw tie
prices they had fetched he said:
when were those painted and by
whom, for. they must be beautiful to
be worth so much"
Beautiful were they before ever a
price was set on them," said the
ghostly visitor. Beautiful, also, were
these, for which you have expended
fortune, when their creators finished
them and sold them for handful of
francs to keep the pot boiling. These
pictures that you see being bought so
years hence are the works of Ameri
can contemporaries of yours. To-day
they are picking up living i'll the
west, in New York, in New England,
and are thankful to keep body and
soul together that they may work at
the art they love. Fancy what they
would think if millionaire of feeling,
having eyes to see and an understand
ing to appreciate the poetry of their
landscapes, should pay generous prices
for these painted poems that are 60
ing for little more than the cost of the
paint that is in them. For then, my
friend, these artists would not need
to wait until they reached Shadow
land before they heard that their
names had become famous"
Lord, give me eyes to see," said
the parvenu, as the vision vanished.
WOU were thinking yesterday, my
u good woman, that you were a
little better than the lady who called
on you although she has more money
than you.
But are you really better than she?
Your husband is salaried man and
her husband is an oil magnate.
Of course that does not necessarily
make her any better than you, be-
cause we all know that your husband
had a college education and her hus-
band was day laborer.
But why should your husbands ed
ucation or her husbands wealth have
anything to do do with you or her?
Let us cut the husbands out of the
question.
Well, then, she has more money
than you.
Does that make you any better than
she? Is the lack of money an un-
mixed blessing carrying with it So
cial superiority?
She with a certain touch of vul.
garity, owing to her ancestors, which
you have not, thanks to your ances.
tors) has a much kinder heart than
you have.
She honestly tries to be herself in
spite of the money she has, while you
have social ambitions that cause you
to be snobbish.
You think you are better than she.
She never thinks about social sta
tus.
You feel bitter toward her because
her husband is immensely wealthy.
She feels well disposed toward you
because she thinks both you and your
husband are clever-and with her
clever has a better meaning than the
commonly accepted one.
No; in spite of her money and her
position she is more Of woman than
you are in spite Of your blood and
YOUR husbands education.
Copyright, by James Pott & Coz
An Anecdote of Success.
Of Melville E. Stone, Chicago ed
&hA MI