tones of regret, among whom were three graduates of Harvard who have devoted great attention to the drama. One of these said, "It was the most school-boy performance I ever saw;" the other said, "I could not imagine a worse Hamlet. Several ladies remarked that it showed an entire lack of taste or instinct as to what the drama is or what its expression should be. I asked one of these ladies what was the effect on the audience; and she answered, "Oh, they clapped! I suppose they were friends of those on the stage." Such performances are indeed sad; they pervert the taste of the audience, and do more to degrade the work of Expression than an earnest teacher or artist can do in years to improve. The unintelligent applause of the audience confirms the ignorance, vulgarity, and egotistic assumption of the actor; and if any one criticises the rendering, the prompt decision is, “Oh, he is prejudiced, bigoted, and does not know what he is talking about." An account of this particular performance will be sent all over the country in private letters to those interested in Elocution, whose names are gathered by a careful system, as a great commendation of those who brought out this play.

One of the great needs of public reading is that it should not be put upon the plane of amateur performances. It should be arraigned to the standard of professional criticism. Public readers have been very sensitive

in this matter, and they have themselves to blame that all public reading is regarded to-day in the category of amateur entertainments. The papers of the country speak very guardedly, and as kindly as possible, of amateur performances, and never arraign them to the professional standard, except in some rare case when an earnest dramatic critic seeks to lift some department of

art, like public reading, to the plane of art in the professional sense of the word. Yet we have never had, so far as I know, one good, thorough criticism upon the work of any public reader.

Vocal Expression has too often stood independent of the spirit of art, if not antagonistic to it. Its ambition has often been to provide mere amusement, and to have for its highest aim the raising of a laugh. There is no kind of an artist who needs to struggle harder than the public reader to keep himself in touch with the noblest art of his time, in order that he may gratify the highest emotions in those to whom he gives an interpretation of the literature of his age.

The sculptor is always interested in painting, and the painter is nearly always interested in music. The arts are sisters; but the elocutionist often disdains the sisterhood, and in many cases refuses to study long, like other artists, so as to refine and ennoble his expression, and to develop his artistic nature. The result is that he sinks. to the plane of rendering the lowest literature of his time, and becomes inadequate to interpret properly the true spirit of the best literature of his age, and totally unable to give the spirit of the permanent literature of the world. More than any other art, Vocal Expression needs to study or to appreciate the other arts. It needs to study painting and sculpture, and the arts which permanently embody the fundamental principles of all expression, the arts which eliminate the accidentals, and portray the few elements which must be the most essential. Studying these arts, he finds an embodiment of the art principle in permanent form.

The public reader needs especially to study the highest and truest principles of literary art. Elocution is simply

an interpretative art; and it is sad to see students profess to interpret that which they have never studied, - profess to render works of literature without having a thorough comprehension of their character, and without having developed any true literary insight or taste. The public reader must have both artistic insight and literary taste, for the art of expression more than all others has the plenitude of nature. Sculpture is in three dimensions of space, painting in two; music is only in time; but in the rendering of poetry the public reader must use not only time, but the three dimensions of space. He paints pictures in every phrase, incarnates his point of view and his feeling, and portrays a character at every movement; hence he must have the pictorial instinct, the plastic, the musical, the poetic, as well as the dramatic. He is, in short, to have something of the spirit of all the arts; for while his art dies the moment it is born, it contains a greater number of elements than any other art. It has the life of the imagination and of passion; it is a direct rendering of the immediate processes of his mind. More than any other art, it shows taste or vulgarity, artistic insight or the lack of culture; and, on the other hand, more than any other art, it can come into immediate contact with the artistic nature of an audience, and quicken imagination and noble feeling by interpreting the highest literature. Dramatic art may be the most potent means of awakening the imagination, and of stimulating artistic appreciation.

ONE often sees now in criticisms upon paintings such compliments as this: "There is no elocution." What volumes such a phrase speaks as to the estimate of elocution, when it is considered as a synonym of affectation !

HOW CAN WE DEVELOP A HIGHER APPRECIATION OF ART?

THE

say, but

HE artists of America already lead the world in technical execution. Some think they have little to many of them are able to say it well. The chief hindrance, however, to the elevation of art is the lack of appreciation of the higher forms of poetic creation on the part of the public. The artists have advanced more rapidly than the artistic taste and appreciation of the community. One reason why our artists lack in poetic conception is because they feel no response to their best efforts. Hence, the public are partly to blame for their lack of theme. Art can never be educated except through the development of the imagination and emotional appreciation of the whole people; and art cannot become. great until it is the expression of an intense, national life and ideal spirit.

Many encouraging signs are seen on every hand that we are on the verge of a great renaissance of the art spirit. In our large cities, nothing is more manifest than the increased interest and attendance at our Art Museums. All classes of society can be found at the Boston Art Museum, the Art Institute of Chicago, the St. Louis Museum of Fine Arts, the Academy at Philadelphia, and the Metropolitan Museum in New York. Still, many wealthy cities are without public art collections of any kind, and some of the galleries already in existence have very imperfect collections of paintings, and even of plaster casts. Many prosperous and wealthy towns are without Art Leagues or Clubs, of any kind. Art is of a social nature, and demands association; not only must the artists have affiliation with one another, but there is need of co-operation among those who are striving to appreciate art. Nothing is more needed to-day than some plan by which these desirable ends can be brought about.

On another page of this number will be found a short ac

count of the Art League of the South, by the Secretary. They have written to me several letters for advice, and without solicitation have made "Expression" their organ. As this has come spontaneously, I shall do all I can to aid their cause.

All art ists or lovers of art should join the league as artist or lay members, and communicate with its President or Secretary.

One of the letters of the President contains a suggestion that there should be a wider organization, to include not only painters, sculptors, and architects, but musicians, writers, public readers, and all who are striving either to do or to appreciate artistic work. The arts are sisters, and flourish always side by side. No one art can be elevated to a high plane without the simultaneous elevation of the others. Taste always shows itself in a variety of ways. The imagination, in its very nature, must have many points of view, and give expression to its energy in many different forms. However ideal the work of a painter, it cannot greatly influence a community in which there is a lack of taste for music, or for any noble literature. The artist cannot look indifferently upon the degradation of public reading and impersonation, for bad art of any form drags down its sisters. It is for this reason that all the ablest associations have dealt more or less with many arts.

What a grand thing it would be if there could be an Art Association of the United States, which would be the centre for the co-operation of all Art Museums, Art Schools, and Leagues of the country! Sometime there may be such an association, with a man as president like Professor Halsey C. Ives, who did more than any other person to bring together the great art collection at the World's Fair, · an association with an endowment enabling it to collect annually an exhibition of pictures to be taken from city to city; which should arrange for occasional transfers from Museum to Museum, as is now done to some extent in England, and thus unite the artistic spirit of the whole country. We may not dare to hope for a Secretary of the Fine Arts in the cabinet of the President, as is the case in