Year: 1878

! For THE HERALD.


BROADBRHM'S PARIS LET
TER


! NO. 4.


The Sevres Ccllection---The Wonderful Gobe-
lins---Gen. Grants Ovation General News
You will recollect that I left off
my description last week with the
Prince of Wales collection. Now
pass down the hail to the right
and we find ourselves before the
celebrated Sevres collection. This
exhibition is rather to be valued for
it's excellence than it's extent and
in one sense it is previously dis
appointing. The fame Of this great
establishment has been so world.
wide, that one would naturally ex-
pect to find 8 large and varied col.
lection; the very reverse is the
case, there being an entire absence
of those magnificent tea and dinner
sets, which are associated in the
minds of every one with the name
of Seyres porcelain. One small set
of tea cups is; all, the rest being
made up OF magnificent vases
which call for more than passing
mention. The vases here exhibited
are not exceptional in design; in
that respect they are surpassed by
number in different parts Of the
Exposition, but as specimens Of
pure exalted artistic beauty, they
stand where you awould naturally
expect to find them without a rival.
OF one feature it is impossible to
speak in terms Of too fattering
commendation, and that is the no.
bic purity and chastity Of the orna-
mentation. One prizes such a rev.
lation as this the more when you
are surrounded by unclean things,
and there is much in this Great
Exposition that might safely be rel
egated to the dissecting room, or
the closet of. the anatomical stu
dent. In the Sevres collection,
what there is of it, everything is
beautiful a pair of black vases
enamelled with figures of the purest
and feeciest white, challenge es-
pecial admiration. The work is
wonderful and soft as midsummer
night dream. Another vase is OF
the loveliest amber, on which fairy
figures melt into the clouds, and on
another peacock, gorgeous in his
rainbow plumage, is one OF the
most remarkable works Of art in
in the entire collection. There is
but one small tea set, which rests
in a beautiful case; on q casual
glance you would be inclined to
pass it by; but if you did, you
would miss one of the rarest pieces
of art ever seen in any land. Not
one in thousand examines it
critically, and I can scarcely blame
them when they are surrounded by
so much that it is beautiful and
striking; but this little set is one
of those gems which one seldom
sees in q lifetime. You are nownear
some works the equal of which has
never been produced in the world.
Everybody who has travelled, i'm
agines that they have seen les Go6e-
Inns. Faded hangings are to be
found in almost every European
palace. In Paris they are for sale
in most of the secondhand shops,
and in Florence or Rome they are
more common than clean faces.
But to see the latest glory of the
Gobelins which, by the way, is
rather a misnomer, you will have
to come to the Paris Exposition.


There may have been things be-
fore as beautiful in art; but I have
never seen them Or heard of them.
Against the wall, almost in the
midst Of the Sevres collection, is
the figure in tapestry of ''The New
Moon" It is the nude figure Of a
female holding an arrow piercing
the new moon. Everything about
this work is pure as the spotless
snow, clear as a ray of sunlight,
chaste as Diana's visage. The
most difficult thing in art is to
strip earth from its earthiness and
dross and to carry the mind up
ward and hea7enward to the full
realization of how the angels
looked yet this the artist has done
in this sublime work which must
he Seen IN he annreciated. for no