Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-11-24
Qriun1phS ofA
MJonquelleX
By MELVILLE DAWSON Posi- =
g 1000 NEA Service. Inc

time of its destruction by fire, lit
orally packed with masterpieces
beautiful works of art of an incred-
ible value" .
She did not move the position of
her body in the chair. But she
again vaguely touched her lips with
| the handkerchief in her fingers, a bit
of f1lmy lace.
Monsieur" she said. there have
been in the world three men who
lare supreme in what is perhaps the
| highest of all artistic production. l
shall name them to you-Monsleur
| Whistler, the American: Monsieur
Helleu of Paris, and Wagenheim oil
! Munich"
The Woman on the Terrace
She moved a triie in the hall
Then she went on.
1.-THE misfortune of producing a
masterpiece in oil or in w~ater-color
is that one copy only of this master
piece exists, and if by any misfor-
tune it is destroyed, every adequate
evidence of it's beauty has disap-
peared forever. This is the unfor-
tunate feature attached to the work
i of all the great masters.
"But 1t Is a misfortune that does
not attend the etchings Of Monsieur
whistler, Monsieur Helleu, and
Herr Wagenheim. The beautiful
face OF the lovely Americans pre-
served by the etchings of Monsieur
Helleu can be reproduced in n
number. That beauty does not de-
pend upon the jeopardy of a single
picture"
Her voice seemed to advance, but
not with the stimulus of any emo
ton.
1T is not commonly known" she
said, that an extreme skill is re-
! quired to obtain in the prints all the
beauties of these etchings. The
prints are commonly made by per-
SOL having only the usual work
mans skill.
But it was always realized by
the masters of this art that the ex-
treme and delicate beauties of
their etchings could be produced
only by an adequate skill, by a skill
almost equal to their own, in the
printing of the picture. This skill
constitutes the peculiar genius of
Monsieur Dillard-a skill which he
has striven to perfect, and which he
has finally brought to the highest
excellence.
He labored in the house in the
Faubourg st. German for a long
time and with an incredible patience
until he became the superior of any
man living, and the house. as 1 have
said. was literally packed with the
most beautiful and most valuable
reproductions of this character in
the world. This accumulated treas
IRE represented the incredible for
tune which was before Monsieur
billiard and myself.
at was on the night that he had
gone to Bordeaux in order to make
some arrangement for the removal
of the treasure that the unfortunate
fire occurred that wiped out our
fortune in IN hour, leaving mon
sieur penniless and myself with but
the ruin of another illusion. And It
happened, monsieur, in the simplest
fashion"
There was absolute silence on the
terrace before the villa. The vaguely
blue sea seemed to underlie a world
of amethyst. Heavy odors were in
the air. A little beyond the terrace
the leaves of a towering vine moved
where the footmen of the Princess
kttzenzof searched as noiselessly as
ghosts for the lost parrot. The sha-
dowy figures Of the two footmen
were outlined to the woman in the
chair. and perhaps to Monsieur
Jonquelle, hut they were not visible
to the American.
He sat lise a tense figure in some
organic medium, grim. rigid; always
in that imnobility which seemed to
await the next word before it fash
ed into violent life: as though
madame's words were the delicate
implement of a vivisectionist mov-
ing about a nerve which it never
touched, but which it constantly
menSGsd
- was the simplest accident"
the woman repeated in her placid
voice. The original etchings of an
immortal like one of the three
which l have already named are
priceless-they cannot be replaced.
Out Of the fear that the house
might be entered, after the repro
ductions had been made, these or
iginals were placed under some rub
Dish in the basement of the houss.
This basement had not been en-
tered for a long time, and when
these originals were concealed there
care was taken not to disturb the
appearance which this room pre-
sented OF not having been. opened
for an incredible age.
1T "a low, with an earth floor.