Chapter IV: Part 4

The horse as we know him, and carrying more familiar burdens, is shown in numerous equestrian statuettes, the best of which is the slender, nervous figure of Bonaparte as First Consul, mounted on a proudly-stepping Arab. There is another one of Napoleon, showing him at a later period of his life, and the other equestrian portraits include one of the Duke of Orleans, who looks every inch a gentleman; one of Gaston de Foix, the hero of Ravenna; and one of Charles VII. Then there is a spirited statuette of a Tartar warrior in chain armor sharply pulling back his steed, and a graceful figure of a lady wearing the riding-dress of 1830. A painful contrast is presented by the doomed horse unwillingly carrying a lion whose dreadful grip his frantic rearing cannot loosen. In addition there are many studies of horses, various in breed and attitude, and the small wax model of a young man mastering a horse which though but a rough "first sketch" has all the "go and fire" possible. It would have been of interest if some illustration of Barye's equestrian monument of Napoleon at Ajaccio could have been shown, and this reminds me that except a photograph of the Château d'Eau at Marseilles, showing the four groups of animals designed by him (which Mr. Cyrus J. Lawrence was thoughtful enough to send), and the two reclining river-gods from the Louvre (sent by Mr. Walters), there is nothing which gives any idea of Barye's public work. Not even photographs of the War, Order, Glory and Peace groups of the Louvre, which could have easily been taken from the copies given by Mr. Walters to Baltimore, now on Mount Vernon Place, are present. But, in face of the admirable collection here gathered together, this may savor of ingratitude, and I will return to the consideration of the remaining sculptures.

Among them are some masterly pieces of decoration, the most important being the superb candelabra made for the Duc de Montpensier. These have seated at their base nude figures of the three chief goddesses of classic mythology, whose noble proportions and purity of outline prove the versatility and completeness of the sculptor's art. Juno is accompanied by her peacock and bears the rod of power; Minerva lifts a sword, and Venus holds the golden apple. The candelabra are further enriched with masks and chimeras, and bear at their top a charming circular group of the three graces, small undraped figures, with arms entwined and faces turned toward each other. The general design and exquisite detail of this work is worthy of the Renaissance. There are some more candlesticks and other works of decorative art, all of which bear the marks of a master-hand.

The humorous side of things is presented by some of the groups: in the ungainly figure of the elephant of Senegal running; in the bear lying on his back in a trough and eating with great gusto some sweet morsel which he holds between his paws; and in the meditative stork standing on the back of a turtle. Some of the animals are shown as sleeping or reclining, and there is a cat sitting, a goat feeding, a deer scratching its side and a pheasant walking, among others, but the tragic note is struck in most of them. Probably the best works are to be found among those pieces representing members of the feline race, which were always the subject of Barye's most thorough study. The sculptures of horses are also very numerous, and it strikes one at first as curious that, after all the rebuffs he received from the academic faction, who recognized no animals but the horse and lion as worthy of representation in sculpture, he should have modelled so many of these very creatures. But, after all, Barye's lions and horses belong to an entirely different race from those which the tradition-bound old fogies were pleased with. The collection embraces many admirable bronzes of birds: an eagle holding a dead heron; an owl with a rat; a paroquet on a tree, and a strikingly fine composition of a hawk killing a heron; and there are some beautiful studies of dogs, especially a large seated greyhound, belonging to Mr. Walters. There are rabbits, badgers, wolves and camels, but I remember no cows or pigs, and only one group of sheep. Wild life, much more than domestic, touched the sympathies of Barye.

Mr. Walters loans twenty-three of Barye's powerful water-colors of animals and a fine oil, of unusual size for this artist, of a tiger. One of the most striking of the water-colors shows a great snake swallowing an antelope, whose head is partly engulfed, and it is almost exactly the same as one of the bronzes from the Walters collection. Other gentlemen have contributed water-colors and oil-paintings by Barye, among them being several landscapes at Fontainebleau, and there are various etchings and prints after his works and some of his lithographs, pencil-sketches and autographs, with a copy of the only etching--a stag fighting a cougar--which, according to so good an authority as Mr. Avery, he ever made. These remarkable water-colors alone would suffice to show the genius of Barye, for they are full of the same qualities of truth and originality of expression which we see in his bronzes. Their color is exceedingly fine, and their topics are generally tigers, lions, elephants and serpents. It is a source of wonder how Barye, who never visited the East, could have so well depicted the tropical landscapes in which he has placed these tawny tigers and majestic lions. The drawings, like the sculptures, impress us with their air of absolute veracity, and, even in their most dramatic moments, suggest a reticence behind. Barye does not exhaust himself or his subject, yet he seems to have said the last word in this direction of art, and I cannot imagine that his profound and searching genius will ever be surpassed.

The managers of the galleries announce the exhibition of a hundred "masterpieces" by the contemporaries and friends of Barye, but I do not think that the visitor will find so large a number which can rightly be thus classed. To me it appears that something less than one-half are works of the first order, but among the remainder are many good things worthy of attention. Here again the treasures of Mr. Walters's collection are drawn upon and he sends some twenty-five pictures, prominent among which is the great "Martyrdom of St. Sebastian," by Corot; the "Evening Star," by the same master; Troyon's "Cattle Drinking"; Diaz's "Storm" and "Autumn Scene in the Forest of Fontainebleau"; Rousseau's "Le Givre"; Decamps's "Suicide"; Daubigny's large "Sunset on the Coast of France"; Delacroix's "Christ on the Cross"; and Millet's "Breaking Flax." One of the finest Millets I have ever seen is here, lent by Mr. Walters. This is the "Sheepfold at Night," which with several others of Mr. Walters's paintings here shown, was in the exhibition of "One Hundred Masterpieces" held at Paris in 1883. In its foreground a line of sheep pass by toward the gate of the fold through which some have already entered under the guidance of the shepherd and his dog, who stand near. The horizon is low, and just above it swings a swollen moon, shaped like a cup, from which floods of pale light fill the scene with color. If this were Mr. Walters's only contribution it would be sufficient to place us under a heavy obligation to him. The "St. Sebastian" is a large canvas, measuring four feet wide by eight feet high, which was first shown at the _Salon_ of 1853, and afterwards twice received important changes at the artist's hands. It shows an opening in a great wood, with the saint reclining on the ground tended by two holy women, while above appear some angels who bear the martyr's palm and crown. Rousseau's "Le Givre" is well described by Sensier, who says in his "_Souvenirs sur Th. Rousseau_," it represents "the hills of Valmondois as seen a mile away across the Oise, along the des Forgets road. The composition could not be more simple. Little hillocks heaped in the foreground are covered with half-melted snow, and the sun, red in the midst of a leaden sky, is seen dying and threatening through the clouds." The "Suicide," of Decamps, shows the body of a young artist stretched lifeless on his pallet in a gloomy room, and is painted with extraordinary force. The "Sunset," by Daubigny, describes a scene on the French coast with some cows near a pool separated from the sea only by a few yards. The foreground is rich in sombre greens and browns, the ocean a glorious blue and the sky tinged with the roses of sunset.

A superb specimen of the lately dead veteran, Jules Dupré, "The Old Oak," is lent by Mr. John G. Johnson, who contributes several other pictures, among them a fine "Going to the Fair," by Troyon, in which is seen a drove of cattle and sheep, with a woman on horseback behind talking to a man. Another still finer Troyon, the "Drove of Cattle and Sheep," which brought $26,000 at the Spencer sale, is lent by Mr. Cornelius Vanderbilt. It will be recalled as showing a flock of sheep coming along a road toward the spectator, while behind are two cows, one with head uplifted to avoid the threatening stick of the drover--a dumb but eloquent protest against man's cruelty. Corot's lovely "Lake Nemi," the property of Mr. Thomas Newcombe, is here, while Mr. Jay Gould sends his "Evening"; Mr. William F. Slater, of Norwich, Conn., the "Fauns and Nymphs," and Mr. Charles A. Dana his beautiful "Dance of Loves." To the same gentleman the public is indebted for an opportunity to admire Millet's admirable "Turkey-keeper." Mr. D. C. Lyall has Delacroix's splendid page of romance, "The Abduction of Rebecca," and among the numerous paintings which come from Mr. George I. Seney's gallery, is the same artist's well-known "Convulsionaries," a crowd of self-tortured fanatics wildly rushing through the white-walled streets of Tangiers. There are several other works by Delacroix, including examples of his vivid renditions of lions and tigers, and Mr. Slater has here his "Christopher Columbus," Mr. Potter Palmer, of Chicago, lending the "Giaour and Pacha." Gericault is represented by but one picture, a noble couchant lion, but in addition to the "Suicide," there are several other Decamps, notably the magnificently colored "Turkish Butcher's Shop," which, with a splendid Rousseau, the "Forest of Fontainebleau," comes from the collection of Mr. Henry Graves. The gorgeous blues and crimsons of Diaz's "Coronation of Love," which Mr. Brayton Ives is fortunate enough to own, glow in a corner of one of the galleries--a bouquet of living color. It was pleasant to meet again a familiar picture in Millet's "Waiting," which the writer recalls often seeing at the Boston Art Museum when it belonged to Mr. Henry Sayles. It is now the property of Mr. Seney, and will be at once remembered by any who have ever seen its homely but touching figures of the old mother looking down the road for the coming of her absent son, and the blind father stumbling hastily over the steps to the door. I renewed my acquaintance with the inimitable cat which arches its back, elevates its tail and miaows on the bench outside, its ginger-colored coat relieved against the cool blue-grays of the stone wall. It is the apocryphal story of Tobit and Anna, with the waiting parents made into peasants of Millet's own country, and when it was exhibited at the _Salon_ of 1861, the public, of course, passed it by to gaze at the "Phryne" of Gérôme. Millet has doubtless painted better pictures, but for direct simple pathos it would be hard to surpass this.

Boston, through Mr. Quincy Shaw and other gentlemen, sends to the exhibition some of the best paintings shown. Mr. Shaw exhibits his "Potato-planters," to me the most beautiful in its rosy tones of any example of the artist here; of the same size, a fine "End of the Village of Greville," walled with graystone, its little street monopolized by geese and ducks, and the sea-gulls flying above; and the "Buckwheat Threshers," with two smaller canvases. Mr. F. L. Ames, lends two Millets, a beautiful Rousseau, "The Valley of Tiffauge," Decamps's splendid picture of an African about to sling a stone at a vulture sitting on some ruins, and the superbly painted dogs of Troyon's "Gardechasse." Dr. H. C. Angell's fine Jules Dupré, "Symphony," is also here.

The Millets number about a third of the paintings and among them is an interesting variation of the "Sower," narrower in shape than the others and with a steeper hillside. It would have been a delight to have seen Mr. Shaw's "Sower" temporarily lifted from its place in the modest house which conceals so many treasures, and brought here, especially as it was not possible to borrow the replica belonging to the estate of the late W. H. Vanderbilt, but such good fortune was not in store for us. A beautiful little nude by Millet, "After the Bath," has been sent by Mr. A. C. Clark. I think it must be the same one which was at the Bartholdi Pedestal Fund Exhibition some years ago, when it belonged to Mr. Erwin Davis. Messrs. Boussod, Valadon & Co., have lent an important and beautiful "November" by Millet, showing a sloping field with a harrow lying on the foreground and a man shooting at a flock of birds from behind a tree at the top of the hill.

The "Angelus," draped with crimson, is given the entire end of the long upper gallery and, I think, proves a disappointment to most, if not all. One chief reason for this is its small size,--it is but about 21 x 25 inches--and then it is certainly not to be compared for painting with half a dozen other Millets which are here. Its sentiment is lasting, however, but it is not new to us, on the contrary it is a household word now, and the painting gives but little more than does Waltner's etching. Mr. Walters loans the crayon sketch for it and one of "The Sower" and the "Sheepfold by Moonlight," with others, and there are some very interesting pastels and water-colors by Millet, Rousseau and Delacroix.

Altogether the exhibition is an extraordinarily good one, unapproached as to the Baryes and not easily surpassable as to the paintings of the Fontainebleau school, and any lover of art would find himself amply repaid by it for a journey to New York.

[_Contributors are requested to send with their drawings full and adequate descriptions of the buildings, including a statement of cost._]

"THE LION AND THE SERPENT." M. A. L. BARYE, SCULPTOR.

[Photogravure issued only with the International Edition.]

See article elsewhere in this issue.

AUDITORIUM OF THE PALACE OF THE TROCADERO, PARIS, FRANCE. MM. DAVIOUD & BORDAIS, ARCHITECTS.

[Gelatine Plate issued only with the International Edition.]

AN INTERIOR IN THE CHATEAU DE JOSSELIN, MORBIHAN, FRANCE.

[Gelatine Plate issued only with the International Edition.]

TORRE DEL VINO, ALHAMBRA, GRANADA, SPAIN.

[Grano-chrome issued only with the International Edition.]

RUINS OF THE CHAPEL OF CHARLES V, YUSTE, SPAIN.

[Grano-chrome issued only with the International Edition.]

COOMBE WARREN, KINGSTON, ENGLAND.--GARDEN FRONT. THE LATE MR. GEORGE DEVEY, ARCHITECT.

[Issued only with the International Edition.]

COOMBE WARREN, KINGSTON, ENGLAND.--ENTRANCE FRONT. THE LATE MR. GEORGE DEVEY, ARCHITECT.

[Issued only with the International Edition.]

A GENTLEMAN'S COUNTRY HOUSE. MR. HORACE R. APPELBEE, ARCHITECT.

[Issued only with the International Edition.]

This design is founded upon the Francis I style of architecture, though it by no means slavishly follows it. It was required to obtain a house suited in all respects to modern requirements, including such things as sash-windows, and in places plate-glass. These hardly harmonize with the ordinary character of English country-houses of the Elizabethan and Queen Anne types, with their many mullioned windows and lead-glazed casements, nor is the other extreme of heavy Classic with ponderous detail and a portico two stories high at all desirable. The style of Francis I offers a mean between these, giving emphasis to the principal block by a certain amount of symmetrical planning, together with picturesqueness, with rich and refined detail, which a gentleman's country-house certainly requires. The exterior would be of long and thin red bricks, with stone cornices and other dressings, and roofed with green slates. The interior has oak-work and enriched plaster ceilings to the principal rooms, with the exception of the hall, where the ceiling would be of oak. The hall and the staircase would have some stained-glass in the windows. The original drawing was exhibited in this year's Academy.

WROUGHT-IRON GATES, DUKE STREET, CHELMSFORD, ENGLAND.

[Issued only with the International Edition.]

HISTORICAL FIGURES FROM LORD MAYOR'S PROCESSION, 1889. DESIGNED BY MR. JOHN JELLICOE.

[Issued only with the International Edition.]

These figure sketches embrace five typical examples from the late Lord Mayor's show, in which Mediæval, Tudor and Stuart costumes were (thanks to the research and artistic knowledge of Hon. Lewis Wingfield) so pleasantly associated. We have selected five, both on account of their diversity and also because of their being representative costumes of different eras in English history. The dresses, for magnificence and accuracy of detail, have rarely been equalled.

HOUSE OF MRS. CHARLES BLAKE, BEACON ST., BOSTON, MASS. MESSRS. STURGIS & CABOT, ARCHITECTS, BOSTON, MASS.

[Issued only with the Imperial and International Editions.]

COMPETITIVE DESIGN FOR THE CATHEDRAL OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE, NEW YORK, N.Y. MR. GLENN BROWN, ARCHITECT, WASHINGTON, D.C.

Although the selection of material is a matter that can be well dispensed with until the general design has been determined, the architect suggests as in harmony with the treatment, Westerly, R.I. granite for the body of the cathedral, with trimmings of carved capitals, bases, columns, belts, arches and other ornamental stonework of a Georgia marble. The granite is cream color, with a suspicion of red, and the marble is of the same shade but a trifle darker and more positive. Both from chemical and physical tests they are apparently of equal strength and durability. The colors suggested would not give the building the cold appearance of white marble, or the somewhat sombre appearance produced by gray granite.

The stones are to be laid in square blocks, regular courses and rock-face in the body of the building, with square and sharp corners. The columns, lintels, sills, belts, finials and mouldings are to be close hammered work, with carving where indicated on the drawings.

The different tower roofs are to be fine-hammered or rubbed granite. The distinction between the tower roofs and the body of the building is not brought out clearly in the different drawings, as this would require shading all the granite stonework except the tower roofs, and shading is prohibited by the instructions.

The interior of the church is designed to be finished in marbles of harmonious colors, with carved and other decorated work, as shown in the section. The surface of the floor is to be laid in mosaic tile, the presumption being that fixed pews will not be used in the cathedral. Ample storage can be obtained for portable seats in the cellar.

The floors are laid on terra-cotta arches, built on iron beams, and the beams are protected by terra-cotta casings.

The roof of the building is to be covered with slate [preferably red], laid on terra-cotta and supported by iron trusses and beams; the iron-work to be protected by a fireproof covering. The tower roofs contemplate granite, lapped and jointed so as to be weatherproof, laid on iron beams and supported by iron trusses. If a cheaper covering is desired, slate or tile can be used without affecting the design.

The ceiling is a barrel-vault with large and small arched ribs pierced in each bay by the small vaults in which the clerestory windows open. It may be treated in one of three ways: first, finished in marble; second, marble ribs, the larger surfaces being terra-cotta blocks covered with mosaic tile; third, the larger surfaces frescoed on plaster. The ceiling of the lantern in the centre of the cathedral will be supported by arch trusses, and show metallic ribs on the interior, glazed with cathedral glass.

The screens between the choir and aisles and between the aisle and vestries and chapels are intended to be of wrought-iron, bronze or brass, or a combination. They should be arranged so as to slide down into the cellar and leave the entire building open and unobstructed whenever it might be thought desirable.

The outside doors are to be bronze, with figures on them in low relief.

The size of columns and piers, and the weights imposed upon them, the thrusts of arches and trusses, their proper abutments and ties and other constructional problems have been calculated with a sufficient degree of accuracy to determine the feasibility of the execution of the design according to the drawings.

In the lantern where the frescoing is contemplated the wall will be faced with porous brick, on which the proper fresco plaster can be spread.

The plan is arranged to facilitate the ingress and egress of large assemblages of people, five doorways being provided in the nave entrance and two in each of the transepts. The galleries over the nave and transept vestibules and the triforium have stairways with entrances on the side porches. Including the clergy entrances, fifteen outside doors are planned. The vestibules and porches connect with each other so that worshippers can pass from one to the other under cover.

The arrangement adopted for the central tower allows a central auditorium about one hundred feet in diameter, unobstructed by columns or piers, with the nave transepts and choir opening into it. The aisles are not decreased by this central enlargement, as they deflect through the four abutting towers.

The different vestry-rooms, library or sacristy and the treasury are grouped conveniently to the choir, with separate entrances for the church officials. The meeting-room for the clergy or chapter and the chapel have entrances independent of the church, or by lowering the screen they can be thrown open into the cathedral. Toilet-rooms, custodian's and a committee-room are located on the transept vestibules, as these entrances would most probably be constantly open.

Elevators are placed in two of the supplemental towers, and stairways in the ones adjoining the choir, landing visitors on the triforium gallery, which encircles the building, and in the two galleries which encircle the central lantern. From the lantern galleries visitors can obtain fine interior views of the building, and comprehend the crucial form of the plan at a glance.

TABULATIONS OF APPROXIMATE DIMENSIONS.

Length. Breadth. Height. Square feet.
Ground-floor including
walls height to the
ridge of roof 400 156 to 230 148 69,000

Lantern or central tower
exterior 106 106 400 11,236

Nave interior 125 50 100 6,250

Transepts interior 30 50 100 3,000 for
the two

Choir interior 95 50 100 4,750

Central tower interior 88 88 200

Aisles interior 16 40

Chapel and Chapter 52 26

Square feet of auditorium exclusive of aisles, columns
and space between columns, triforium and galleries 20,486

Auditorium including everything except choir 48,106

ABBEY OF ABERBROTHWICK: GALLERY OVER ENTRANCE.

ABBEY OF ABERBROTHWICK: THE WESTERN DOORWAY.

The traveller by sea, along the east coast of Scotland, is liable to be reminded with startling emphasis of the demolition to which the ecclesiastical architecture of the country has been subjected. Leaving behind him on his northward course the fragments of the metropolitan Cathedral of St. Andrews, he crosses a wide arm of the sea, and when he again approaches the shore, the objects most prominent against the sky are the still more disastrously shattered remnants of the great Abbey of Aberbrothwick. One lofty fragment presents in its centre a circle, doubtless once filled with richly moulded mullions and stained-glass, but through which the blue sky is now visible. This vacant circle is the only symmetrical form in these lofty masses that at a distance strikes the eye--all else is shapeless and fragmentary. Around these huge unsightly vestiges of ancient magnificence the types of modern comfort and commercial wealth cluster thickly, in the shape of a small but busy manufacturing town, with its mills, tall chimneys and rows of substantial houses.

The ruins, which are interesting only in their details, scarcely present a more inviting general aspect as they are approached. Nearing them from the High Street of the burgh, the first prominent object is a grim, strong, square tower, the sole remaining complete edifice of the great establishment, now used as a butcher's shop. It was not perhaps without design that this formidable building was so placed as to frown over the dwellings of the industrious burghers--it was the prison of the regality of the abbey--the place of punishment or detention through which a judicial power, scarcely inferior to that of the royal courts, was enforced by this potent brotherhood; and thus it served to remind the world without, that the coercive power of the abbot and his chapter was scarcely inferior to their spiritual dignity and their temporal magnificence. Passing onward, the whole scene is found to be a chaos of ruin. Fragments of the church, with those of the cloisters and other monastic edifices, rise in apparently inseparable confusion from the grassy ground; but, with a little observation, the cruciform outline of the church can be traced, and then its disjointed masses reduce themselves into connected details. The dark-red stone of which the building was constructed is friable, and peculiarly apt to crumble under the moist atmosphere and dreary winds of the northeast coast. The mouldings and tracery are thus wofully obliterated, and the facings are so much decayed as to leave the original surface distinguishable only here and there. At comparatively late periods large masses of the ruins have fallen down; and Pennant mentions such an event as having taken place just before he visited the spot. This palpable progress towards the complete extinction of the relics of one of the finest Gothic buildings in Scotland, certainly rendered it not only justifiable but highly praiseworthy that the Exchequer should make some effort for preserving so much of the pile as was preservable. Restoration was not to be expected--the preservation of the existing fragments was all that could be reasonably looked for. It must be confessed, however, that the operations, by means of which this service was accomplished, have given no picturesque aid to the mass of ruins, but have rather introduced a new element of discordance and confusion, in the contrast between the cold, flat, new surfaces of masonry and the rugged, weatherbeaten ruins in which they are embodied.

There are few buildings in which the Norman and the early English are so closely blended, and the transition so gentle. The great western door has the Norman arch, with an approach to the later types in some of its rather peculiar mouldings, while the broad and equally peculiar gallery above it--the only interior portion of the church remaining in a state of preservation--shows the pointed arch, with all the simplicity of the Norman pillar and capital. All the material fragments of the church now remaining are represented in the four accompanying plates, from which as full an idea of the shape and character of the remains may be derived as the visitor could acquire on the spot. It will be seen that over the gallery, at the western end of the nave, there widens the lower arc of a circular window, which must have been of great size. The only portions of the aisle windows still existing are on the south side of the nave. None of the central pillars remain, but their bases have been carefully laid bare: and it is supposed, from the greater size of those at the meeting of the cross, that here there had been a great central tower.

Among the tombs of more modern date, in the grave-yard near the church, there are many which bear sculptural marks of a very remote antiquity; and among the ornaments they present, the primitive form of the cross is conspicuous. During the operations for cleaning out the ruins, which were conducted under the authority of the Exchequer in 1815,[3] some pieces of monumental sculpture were discovered, two of which are curious and remarkable. The one is the mutilated figure of a dignified churchman--probably an abbot. The head, the hands--which appear to have been clasped--and the feet, are broken off and lost; but the fragment thus truncated has much appearance of grace in the folds of the drapery and the disposition of the limbs, while a series of rich ceremonial ornaments appear to have been brought out with great force and minuteness. The other figure, still more mutilated, is simpler in the ordinary details, but has attached to it some adjuncts which have perplexed the learned. The feet appear to have rested on the effigy of a beast, the remains of which indicate it to have represented a lion. It has, from this circumstance, been inferred that the statue was that of William the Lion, the founder of the abbey. The figure has, however, been attired in flowing robes, and a purse hangs from the girdle. But the portions of this fragment which chiefly contributed to rouse curiosity, are some incrustations, which had at first the appearance of the effigies of lizards crawling along the main figure. It was supposed that these reptiles were intended to embody the idea of malevolent spirits, and that the piece of sculpture might have been designed to represent a myth, probably in reference to the machinations of the infernal world. But, upon a closer inspection, it was found that these tiny figures represented pigmy knights in armor, scrambling, as it were, up the massive figure. One appears to be struggling with the drapery below; another has reached the waist; and the fracture, which is across the shoulder, leaves dangling the mailed heels of two others, which must have reached the neck. Is it possible that there can be here any reference to the slaughter of Becket, to whom the abbey was dedicated?

FOOTNOTE:

[3] New Stat. Account, Forfar, p. 80.

HISTORICAL SKETCH.

The historical circumstances connected with the foundation of this monastic institution are remarkable. It was founded and endowed by William the Lion, King of Scots, in the year 1178, and dedicated to St. Thomas à Becket, the martyr of the principle of ecclesiastical supremacy, whose slaughter at the high altar of Canterbury Cathedral occurred in 1170, and who was canonized in 1173. This great establishment, richly endowed, was thus a magnificent piece of homage by the Scottish King to a principle which, especially under the bold and uncompromising guidance of its great advocate, had solely perplexed and baffled his royal neighbor on the English throne, and boded future trouble and humiliation to all thrones and temporal dignities. Much antiquarian speculation has been exerted, but without very obvious success, to fathom the motives for this act of munificence. William had invaded those parts of the north of England which were previously held in a species of feudality by the Kings of Scotland, and was disgracefully defeated at Alnwick, and committed to captivity, just at the time when the English monarch, whose forces accomplished the victory and capture, was enduring his humiliating penance at the tomb of the canonized archbishop. Lord Hailes, who says that "William was personally acquainted with Becket, when there was little probability of his ever becoming a confessor, martyr and saint," endeavoring to discover a motive for the munificence of the Scottish King, continues to say: "Perhaps it was meant as a public declaration that he did not ascribe his disaster at Alnwick to the ill-will of his old friend. He may, perhaps, have been hurried by the torrent of popular prejudices into the belief that his disaster proceeded from the partiality of Becket towards the penitent Henry; and he might imagine that if equal honors were done in Scotland to the new saint as in England he might, on future occasions, observe a neutrality."[4] It is remarkable that several of the early chroniclers allude to this friendship between the Scottish monarch, who was a resolute champion of temporal authority, and the representative of ecclesiastical supremacy....

Princes may be induced, by personal circumstances, to change their views, and in the times when they were not controlled by responsible ministers, they gave effect to their alterations of opinion. It is quite possible that at the time when he founded the Abbey, William was partial to Church ascendency, for his celebrated contest with the ecclesiastical power arose out of subsequent events. This King's disputes with the Church have a somewhat complex shape. The clergy of his own dominions had a spiritual war against the English hierarchy, who asserted a claim to exercise metropolitan authority over them; and it might have been supposed that William, if he sought to humble his own clergy, would have found it politic to favor the pretensions of those of England. But the interests of the two clerical bodies became in the end united. Thus the war which had so long raged in England, passed towards the north, with this difference, that the King of Scots had to encounter not only his own native hierarchy, but the victorious Church of England, just elated by its triumph over Henry. The Chapter of St. Andrews had elected a person to be their bishop, not acceptable to William, who desired to give the chair to his own chaplain. The King seized the temporalities, and prevailed on the other bishops to countenance his favorite. The bishop-elect appealed to Rome. Pope Alexander III issued legatine powers over Scotland to the Archbishop of York, who, along with the Bishop of Durham, after an ineffectual war of minor threats and inflictions, excommunicated the King, and laid the kingdom under interdict. At this point Alexander III died, and the new pope thought it wise to make concessions to an uncompromising adversary in a rude and distant land, who had shown himself possessed of an extent of temporal power sufficient to counteract the power of Rome, even among the ecclesiastics themselves.

It was before this great feud commenced that the Abbey was founded; but during its continuance the institution received, from whatever motives, many tokens of royal favor, as well as precious gifts from the great barons. Among the list of benefactors we find many of those old Norman names, which cease to be associated with Scottish history after the War of Independence. It is a still more striking instance of the community of interest between the two kingdoms anterior to this war, that while we find a Scottish king devoting a great monastic establishment to the memory of an English prelate, we should find an English king conferring special privileges and immunities within his realm on the Scottish brotherhood....

The Abbey was founded for Tyronesian monks, and the parent stock whence it received its first inmates was the old Abbey of Kelso. In the year of the foundation, Reginald, elected "Abbot of the Church of St. Thomas," was, with his convent, released of all subjection and obedience to the abbot and convent of Kelso. The church was completed and consecrated under the abbacy of Ralph de Lamley, in 1233. Aberbrothwick was one of those ecclesiastical institutions immediately connected with the spread of the Roman hierarchy, which gradually sucked up the curious pristine establishment of the Culdees; and the muniments of the Abbey thus afford some traces of the character and history of this religious body, at least towards the period of their extinction. Thus, while the Church of Abernethy, an ancient seat of the Culdees, is granted by King William to his new foundation, Orme of Abernethy, who is also styled Abbot of Abernethy, grants the half of the tithes of the property of himself and his heirs, the other half of which belongs to the Culdees of Abernethy, while some disposals of a strictly ecclesiastical character are made by the same document. Thus we find an abbot who makes disposal for his heirs--a counterpart to those references to the legitimate progeny of churchmen, which frequently puzzle the antiquary in his researches through early Scottish ecclesiastical history.

The Abbot of Aberbrothwick possessed a peculiar privilege, the origin of which is in some measure associated with the Culdees--the custody of the Brecbennach, or consecrated banner of St. Columba. The lands of Forglen, the church of which was dedicated to Adomnan the biographer of Columba, were gifted for the maintenance of the banner. The privilege was conferred on the Abbey by King William, but as it inferred the warlike service of following the banner to the King's host, the actual custody was held by laymen, the Abbey enjoying the pecuniary advantages attached to the privilege, as religious houses drew the temporalities of churches served by vicars.

It will readily be believed that this, one of the richest and most magnificent monastic institutions in Scotland, numbered many eminent men among its abbots, who from time to time connect it with the early history of Scotland. It is even associated with a literature that has survived to the present day, in having been presided over by Gavin Douglas, the translator of Virgil. The two Beatons, Cardinal David and Archbishop James, also successively its abbots, give it a more ambiguous reputation. At the Reformation, the wealth of the Abbey was converted into a temporal lordship, in favor of Lord Claude Hamilton, third son of the Duke of Chatelherault, and the greater part of the temporalities came, in the seventeenth century, into the hands of the Panmure family.

In a tradition immortalized by a fine ballad of Southey's, it is said that the abbots of Aberbrothwick, in their munificent humanity preserved a beacon on that dangerous reef of rock in the German Ocean, which is supposed to have received its name of the "Bell Rock" from the peculiar character of the warning machinery of which the abbot made use:

"The Abbot of Aberbrothwick
Had placed that bell on the Inchcape rock,
On a buoy in the storm it floated and swung,
And over the waves its warning rung.

"When the rock was hid by the surge's swell,
The mariners heard the warning bell;
And then they knew the perilous rock,
And bless'd the Abbot of Aberbrothwick."

The tradition represents a rover, in the recklessness of prosperity and sunshine, cutting the bell-rope, and afterwards returning in foul weather to be shipwrecked on the rock from which he had impiously removed the warning beacon. No evidence of the existence of the bell is found in the records of the Abbey; and on the subject of its wanton removal, the sagacious engineer of the Northern Lights say, "It in no measure accords with the respect and veneration entertained by seamen of all classes for landmarks; more especially as there seems to be no difficulty in accounting for the disappearance of such an apparatus, unprotected, as it must have been, from the raging element of the sea."[5]

FOOTNOTES:

[4] Annals, 1178.

[5] Stevenson on the Bell Rock Light-house, 69.

DESIGN FOR A STORE. MESSRS. WAIT & CUTTER, ARCHITECTS, BOSTON, MASS.

BOSTON SOCIETY OF ARCHITECTS.

Recommendations by the Boston Society of Architects, in regard to practice in obtaining estimates from contractors:

1. Drawings, when offered for final or competitive estimates, should be sufficient in number and character to represent the proposed works clearly; should be at a scale of not less than one-eighth of an inch to the foot, and be rendered in ink or some permanent process.

2. Proper details should be furnished for work that is not otherwise sufficiently described for estimate.

3. Specifications should be in ink. They should be definite where not sufficiently defined and explained by drawings, and every distinctive class of work to be included in contract should be mentioned and placed under its appropriate heading.

4. Contractors should be notified, at time of estimate, if they are to be restricted in the employment of their subcontractors.

5. Sub-bids received by architects should be held as confidential communications until all the estimates in a given class of work have been submitted.

The principal contractor should add to his bids all these subestimates while in the architect's office, and should sign a tender in which the names of these above-mentioned subcontractors should be enumerated.

6. A subcontractor should not (without his free consent) be placed under a general contractor, and no general contractor should be compelled to accept (without his free consent) the estimate of any subcontractor.

7. Should a contractor decline to assume in his contract the estimate for any work not included in his original estimate, he should not thereby be denied the contract upon the portions of the work covered by his original estimate.

8. Estimates should not be binding more than thirty days after received.

9. Unless previous notification has been given to the contrary in the specification or otherwise, the lowest invited bidder is entitled to the contract. If radical changes are made, the whole competition should be reopened.

10. After bids have been received, and before the award, bidders should not be allowed to amend their estimates.

[_The editors cannot pay attention to demands of correspondents who forget to give their names and addresses as guaranty of good faith; nor do they hold themselves responsible for opinions expressed by their correspondents._]

BARYE'S ADMIRER.

NEW YORK, N.Y., December 28, 1889.

TO THE EDITORS OF THE AMERICAN ARCHITECT:--

_Dear Sirs,_--I have just seen a letter from "Anglo-American" in your issue of December 14, in which he calls for the name of the English artist who said concerning the French sculptor, Barye: "Had he been born in Great Britain, we would have had a group by Barye in every square in London."

Théophile Silvestre reports this remark as if uttered in his presence. He says (1856) that the speaker was Mr. Herbert, an artist of distinction. Probably this was Arthur J. Herbert. Your correspondent takes the remark perhaps too literally, when it merely meant to express admiration through a slight exaggeration. Mr. Herbert would have been content to see a few squares only decorated with groups by an English equivalent of Barye, had one existed.

As to the assertion by "Anglo-American" that Alfred Stevens was "an artist not inferior to Barye" it will be shared by few who have studied the works of the great French sculptor of animals and men.

"Anglo-American" is right in saying that my short paper in _Harper's Weekly_ errs in giving two bronze groups after Barye to Mount Vernon Square, Baltimore, instead of four. Were I a resident of that city, I could hardly have known this better, and how the error got there puzzles me. Certainly had I been permitted to see a proof of that paper the mistake would have been corrected, unimportant as it is, so far as Barye is concerned. I must compliment your correspondent on the quickness of eye that detected the slip and regret that the proof-reader of _Harper's Weekly_ did not know his Baltimore to the same degree. But he is himself in error when he speaks of the "_Life and Works of Antoine Louis Barye_," written by me and published by the Barye Monument Association as a catalogue. The catalogue is quite another thing from the _édition deluxe_, which is the only edition of the "_Life_."

CHARLES DE KAY.

EVAPORATION OF WATER IN TRAPS.

TO THE EDITORS OF THE AMERICAN ARCHITECT:--

_Dear Sirs,_--In a late issue of your journal an advocate of Trap-venting, says of ordinary S-traps "If the traps are filled even once in two months they will keep their seals intact."

Most persons now agree that S-traps which are back-vented in the ordinary manner require refilling by hand as often as once a fortnight. It is, therefore, clear that the system of back-venting is a very dangerous one. Its original object was to afford security. It is now found (and strangely enough, even by its advocates) that it totally fails in this respect and that it requires an amount of attention which experience and common-sense show us it will never receive.

My experiments on the rate of seal-reduction through evaporation produced by back-venting were made with the greatest care and show a more rapid loss than is generally supposed. If the reports of these experiments are studied, it will be seen that every precaution was taken to secure trustworthy results. Although my experiments on siphonage were made during the same year and on the same system of piping with those on evaporation, it will be seen by studying the drawings and text of the report that the former in no wise interfered with the latter. No experiments on siphonage were made while the water stood high in the traps during the tests for evaporation, and no disturbance of the water seals was made by this or any other cause during the evaporation tests. It would have been exceedingly careless and totally unnecessary to allow of any such disturbance. Moreover, most of the experiments on evaporation were made, as shown, on a stack so connected with the rest of the system of piping that such disturbance would have been impossible. Even had we not so carefully closed the inlet or house-side of the traps.

I found that a warm flue caused the back-vent pipe to evaporate enough of the water from the seal of the trap to break it in less than a week, and I am confident that this often happens in practice.

How short-sighted and foolish is it to endeavor to throw discredit on these experiments which were made with the greatest care and honesty and which were witnessed and subscribed to by impartial experts, and to argue that, because other experiments made under different conditions showed a somewhat slower rate of evaporation, therefore cases could never occur in which the more rapid rate might be encountered in practice.

It is likely that the public will very soon awake to a sense of the importance of investigating this matter for themselves. Their Boards of Health will then find that with a very small outlay they can obtain the truth; and that a vast amount of unnecessary complication and expense can be saved in plumbing and, at the same time greater security be obtained.

When we consider, too, the well-known unreliability of the vent-pipe in other ways and the frequency with which it is found totally closed by grease, it becomes something more than folly to recommend the public to place implicit reliance upon it.

J. P. PUTNAM.

THE DIVINING-ROD.--Professor Ray Lankester, having recently expressed some doubts of the alleged powers of a boy "water-finder." Dr. McClure, who is chairman of the company by whom the boy is employed, has denied emphatically that the boy, whose name is Rodwell, is an impostor. He says that the lad, when tested, never failed to find either water or mineral veins, the lodes having always been found exactly at the places indicated. The divining-rod which he holds only moves in obedience to the muscular contraction of his hands, and a rod of any kind of wood, or even of any material substance whatever, can be used, provided it be a conductor of electricity. Dr. McClure's statements have excited considerable comment in England. The phenomena of tests by the divining-rod are not by any means new. They have never been described from a scientific point-of-view, nor has any philosophical explanation of them ever been advanced, but there is no question whatever of their existence, and of their being now regarded by the most advanced scientists as beyond the region of chicanery and imposture. Mr. W. J. Jenks, in a recent lecture on "The Protection of Electric Light Stations from Lightning," treats the subject very exhaustively, and shows that where the ability to locate electrical or magnetic attraction is vested in an individual the results are absolutely reliable. He instances the case of two gentlemen of Merrimac, Massachusetts, named Prescott, who for several years have given displays of this rare faculty. As an illustration of the certainty with which the Prescott brothers could indicate the location of electrical attraction, Mr. Jenks gives a well-authenticated incident which took place at Amesbury not long ago. Several old citizens were sceptical as to the accuracy of the conclusions supposed to have been reached, and determined on a severe test. Taking twenty or more citizens as witnesses, they requested the Prescott brothers to accompany them, and indicating a stretch of highway before them, some forty or fifty rods in length, stated that some years previous lightning had struck on that road, and wished to be informed as to the exact spot. Proceeding several rods, two cross currents were marked out; both extending for some distance in the travelled pathway and crossed by another at right angles. Testing carefully the roads in both directions, this electrical centre was pointed out as the greatest danger in the vicinity. The party was then invited to examine an ancient volume of official records, where it was chronicled that on the 7th of October, 1802, a man who was driving two yoke of cattle was struck by lightning in that exact spot and, with all his animals, was instantly killed. The occurrence had been deemed at the time so remarkable that the circumstance, with a minute description of the locality, had been recorded, though long forgotten by all but perhaps a few of the oldest citizens.

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THE DANGERS OF ELECTRICITY.--The rapid spread of electric lighting in America has not been accomplished without very considerable loss of life. From a list compiled by Mr. Harold P. Brown, of New York, we learn that eighty-seven persons have been killed up to the commencement of this year. This is a very serious total, and if there were any likelihood of the rate being maintained, it would supply ample reason for very stringent legislative control being exercised over all electric installations. Happily many of the accidents may be attributed to the want of knowledge which always characterizes a new manufacture, while numbers of them are also due to the hasty and careless methods of erection adopted in America. Both these causes may be expected to decrease rapidly in the future, particularly if the municipalities insist on the mains being placed underground, instead of being strung on poles in the streets. Mr. Brown is well-known from his persistent opposition to the alternate current system; he never misses an opportunity of insisting upon its dangers, and of comparing it, to its detriment, with the direct-current system. Now as the alternate system is rapidly spreading all over London and also in many parts of the kingdom, this is a question which interests us directly. Are we running special risks by permitting its establishment? As far as lighting currents of fifty or one hundred volts are concerned, it certainly matters little or nothing whether they are direct or alternate, for neither will produce any serious injury on the human frame. When it comes to currents of distribution of two thousand volts, then it is quite conceivable that death is more certain by the alternate current, but unfortunately it is also fairly certain with the direct current, so that there is very little to choose between them. A house in which the fittings were charged to such a potential would be as dangerous as a battlefield. What is wanted is sufficiently good workmanship to prevent contact ever being made between the distributing mains and the service wires, and this there should be no difficulty in obtaining. Even if a leak should occur the device of putting the service main to earth at one point will prevent it doing any harm. Mr. Brown refers to two cases in which men were killed by contact with a perfectly insulated wire, their death being caused by the static charge. We feel considerable doubt as to the possibility of any one being killed by a static charge under these circumstances; we prefer to believe that the insulator was bad, probably a mere taping of non-waterproof material. Just as the death-rate on a railway varies inversely as the perfection of the signalling appliances, so the fatalities in America from electricity will decrease as better materials are adopted, and more care is expended in erection.--_Engineering._

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