understanding of the motives of seamanship to feel how in the hull every shaving had been counted, and how in the complicated work aloft every spar and cloth, block and bull's-eye, line and seam, had been shaped and fined and fitted to do the duty required of it in the most sinewy way. Phidias could not have told the special duty of every curve and line more beautifully. I have seen a boy rope's-ended for leaving on a rope's end a fray of twine that could not have been seen two yards away. Such untidiness was shockingly incongruous with the lovely form and fine array of the Anne McKim, and the mind too indolent to see this needed a stimulant.

"The beauty most to be desired in a chair is not beauty of carving, of penciling, or of weaving; in a house, not of jigsawing, chiseling, or painting; in a lawn, not of shaven grass, of flowers, of twiggage, or of leafage; in a road, not of flagging, curbing, guttering, and paving. The beauty most to be desired in towns and villages is no more the decorative beauty of our present flurry than that of a ship or of a horse.

"It would seem to have been thought by most of those who directly or indirectly lead village improvements that a choice of beauty is mainly a choice of embellishments. But by far the highest and choicest beauty is that of inherent and comprehensive character and qualities, and whatever of decoration hides this, or withholds attention from it, however beautiful in itself, is in effect a blemish. Many of us see this of late much better than formerly in respect to architecture. It is beginning, that is to say, to be realized that the work of the builder is not to decorate, but to expound, emphasize, and refine upon the work he did in his capacity of constructor, and to develop and brighten its effect.'

"Where the reverse of this occurs, as it yet does in the larger part of our buildings, private and public, we are beginning to recognize the putting away of beauty. A revival of good sense in this respect, even in railroad cars and stations, is so VOL. 95-NO. 6

generally welcomed that we may hope to see it go on yet to steamboats and hotels.

"When, however, we have to deal not with stone and wood, iron and glass, in constructions, but with flowers and plants and trees, groves, woods, forests, hills and dales, mountains and valleys, as we have occasion to do in determining the sites of our houses, in arranging roads, laying out towns and villages, railroads, plantations, and fields, and in placing fences and gateways, fountains and monuments, how much are we given to asking what is to be the effect of our determinations upon the more important conditions of beauty? Is it to be that of emphasizing them, fixing them; or the reverse? Suppose that the general local beauty is but meagre, and that there are blemishes; are our plans laid to obscure and tone down these, and to develop, exalt, and hold the eye and the mind to what nature and circumstances not of our arrangement have provided that are inherently beautiful?"

And so, questioning, my text ends. But let us pursue the matter a little further.

I have in mind an "improved" village common which was, in its unregenerate state, a triangular plot having short-cut paths leading directly from one much frequented point to another, all but two of which had been planted with rows of trees, though most of them had become broken and discontinuous. The older trees were all elms, and along one side of the common there was a double row sufficiently complete to form a fine mall; but "improvers" of the last generation, seeking for variety, had replaced gaps among the elms with maples. They interrupted the sweep of the arched avenue of elms, and weakened it, without removing the impression that an avenue of elms was intended. Imperfection, not variety, was suggested by the maples, because they were introduced in a composition the chief characteristic of which was the ordered continuity of repeated forms.

The rough turf on the common was unsystematically and occasionally mowed,

for the absence of cows formerly allowed to graze here left the grass weedy and rank. Considerable patches were worn in the grass where the boys of the neighboring school played ball. A good deal of litter lay about the grass, and in one low corner water frequently stood in a stagnant pool. There was also a wooden pump, but the water had become of doubtful quality.

Now came an energetic spasm of Village Improvement. First and best, litter and paper were cleared away, barrels for such rubbish were set out (unfortunately of a bad color), lawns were systematically mowed, and the people persistently educated in neatness.

Next, the areas worn bare were seeded, but the boys promptly wore them out again, a difficulty that might perhaps have been met by frequently shifting the diamonds, to distribute the wear, without closing the common to ball playing, as was strongly urged by some of the improv

ers.

The next year a distinct embellishment was undertaken by excavating the objectionable wet spot, supplementing the uncertain natural water supply by a pipe discharging through a boulder rockery at one side of the pond; the rocks very prettily covered with ferns and nasturtiums, with water lilies planted in the pondlet, with shores enlivened by iris and other aquatic plants, all surrounded by a curving path, and a wire fence to keep the dogs away from the flowers. Another year flowering shrubs were introduced back of the rockery, making a strikingly picturesque, if somewhat "gardenesque, composition.

The well having been condemned, a wealthy summer resident gave a drinking fountain, the design for which was made by a clever Boston architect1 based on an Italian fountain of which the donor gave him a photograph. This, too, was a very pretty thing, although its character had no more connection with that of the common at large than had the picturesque water-garden. The architect, feeling the 1 Montgomery Schuyler.

need for some appropriate setting, prevailed upon the committee to grade a little terrace about the fountain and border it with a privet hedge, providing also a straight walk leading in at right angles from the nearest path, and continuing in the same line to the path on the opposite side. The two old paths to the pump had led in slantingly from the most convenient points, and another piece of fence had to be put up to keep people from breaking through the hedge and reverting to one of the old path lines. The old lines had looked reasonable enough with the old pump, but the architect was certainly right in feeling that they were quite too casual and informal to harmonize with the new fountain.

The Daughters of the American Revolution, in order to mark a point of historic interest, set up a large boulder bearing a bronze tablet. The inscription, by the way,was in "stock" lettering, which costs less than half as much as lettering designed for the special purpose, and has a very neat and business-like look, as though it were the product of a sort of gigantic typewriter.

In the meantime further decorative planting was undertaken. A weeping beech, three purple barberries, four golden elders, a Colorado blue spruce, several assorted conifers, six hydrangeas, and some good plants of native rhododendron, were set out. The purple barberries and the golden elders were grouped together (because they always do go together, you know), and pleasant open locations were selected for the others, where they could be readily seen. The local florist was an active and public-spirited member of the Improvement Association, and he has maintained for four years at his own expense, in the middle of the slope above the pondlet, a star and a crescent and a Maltese cross in bulbs, followed by summer bedding plants.

Now what is the net result of all this embellishment? The bit of rich informal gardenesque treatment round the lily pond looks lonely and ill at ease in its

simple and severe surroundings; the specimens of ornamental shrubs and trees dotted here and there are individually interesting, but inconsequential; the delicate and almost hyper-refined Italian fountain and the D. A. R. boulder stare each other out of countenance; and the old common, which forms the framework and background for all this decoration, is quite bewildered and befuddled. Its quiet open spaces are frittered away with decorations, the simplicity of its plain short-cut paths is at odds with the newer introductions, its old character is shattered, and in place of it no single character worthy of the name is to be recognized, but a series of samples suggesting half a dozen different characters, any one of which might, with good effect, be given to the tract, but none of which has been.

The only safe procedure, when one goes a single step beyond the neat and orderly provision for generally recognized practical necessities of the village, is to look fairly and squarely into the future, to adopt a definite and comprehensive plan and policy, and never to undertake or accept a project of improvement without earnestly and deliberately comparing its probable results with the aims of the general plan. However wise and comprehensive they may be, such general plans must from time to time be modified, but the modifications should be thoughtfully and deliberately accepted, not drifted into haphazard.

A savage, forced by the limitations of his condition, may live upon a spare and healthy diet. Give him the opportunities of civilization, and he will gorge himself

with indigestible combinations, selected at random from among the endless number of things that individually please his palate. The civilized man may be equally fond of the same things, but when he wants a good dinner he resolutely rejects nine tenths of the things which please him on the bill of fare, for the sake of adequately enjoying what he elects to have at that particular place and time.

What village improvers seem often to forget is that their selections from the bill of fare are not for a day only, but for many years, and must be considered in relation to the selections of the past and of the future for the locality in which they are to

occur.

"Will it be beautiful?" should be asked as to any proposition for improvement, but it is not by any means the first question to be asked. "Is it in purpose and tendency aiming in the direction we have deliberately chosen?" "Is it appropriate to that particular kind of common, park, street, dooryard, or township, which we can reasonably look forward to having during the period in which the improvement will be effective?" These are the first questions to ask in such a case. They are often hard to answer, but real improvements are not made easily and thoughtlessly. Time, effort, and money expended on embellishments, without painstaking thought as to their ultimate result, are apt to be worse than wasted; while wise forethought as to purposes and tendencies may so shape the simplest utilitarian necessities of a village as to give it the beauty of consistency, harmony and truth.

And in a verbal criticism, by a Japanese connoisseur, of a Western work of art, it was said, "It is a close imitation of nature, but it lacks style."

The ideas expressed in these three bits of criticism embody the æsthetic point of view of the whole Japanese nation, and, when rightly interpreted, supply us with a clue to a sympathetic appreciation of their painting. The Japanese mind shows itself here, as elsewhere, to belong, generally speaking, to that class whose attitude toward art we term formal or classic. Japanese painting, indeed, had

1 I take the liberty of using the translation of these two passages to be found in Mr. Arthur Morison's article on "The Painters of Japan," Monthly Review, July, 1902.

its periods of comparatively romantic and individualistic inspiration. Yet when regarded as a whole, and judged from our modern point of view, it will be seen to be essentially classic in spirit.

Firstly, the primary aim of the Japanese, as of every classic artist, is to reveal the various kinds of beauty which the nature of his art places at his command. The Oriental, for instance, sees in his lines and colors, his darks and lights, the means whereby he can create a sort of visual symphony, which, like the musical, shall produce its effect to a large extent independently of external aid. In other words, ideas that are attached to the elements of his art merely by chance association ideas, that is to say, which are not essentially plastic-do not play a vital part in his æsthetic intention. But this is the classic view-point in a nutshell. For the most characteristic feature of classic art is the fact that the visible image and the thoughts it suggests are indissolubly fused.

Again, the Japanese painter takes special pleasure in certain other qualities which distinguish classic art, lucidity, order, and finish; and his work gives us that sense of harmony and poise which constitutes plastic beauty.

The luxuriant symbolism which is often found in Japanese art does not, to my mind, disprove its classic intention. Symbolic form is in itself no evidence of a lack of classic taste. It is employed in Greek art. Only when it serves to express ideas the meaning of which cannot be conveyed otherwise is it an indication of subjective mystical feeling, of an unclassic frame of mind. Now the use of symbolism in the religious art of Japan, as in that of Greece, is to a large extent traditional. When Buddhism was introduced

from China in the sixth century A. D., symbolism already formed an integral part of it. Buddhistic symbolism is, however, essentially mystical; and it may be urged that the fact of its having preserved in Japan this quality in undiminished vigor proves that it touched a sympathetic chord in the Japanese nature. This, I believe, is true. There is undoubtedly a tinge of mysticism in the Japanese, as in all Orientals. But it remains largely a detached and independent factor in their mental life. For a study of the mind of this Eastern people will show that, while on the one hand it is dreamy and poetic, on the other it is extremely clear, objective, sane. That it is this lucidity of mind which primarily controls their art appears to me indisputable. Most of the arts of Japan have a superadded symbolic meaning: for example, flower arrangement, landscape gardening, poetry, and the dance; yet in respect to formal beauty they are complete in themselves. The understanding of this symbolism is not necessary to an appreciation of their essential charm. The Japanese garden is a complete work of art, even though one may not realize that these stones and trees are symbolically related; their floral designs delight the eye without the observer recognizing the emblem of filial love or wifely devotion. Even when, as in painting, the symbol becomes obvious, assumes definite shape, the work tells as an artistic whole, though the significance of the emblem be unknown. Forever sensitive to what is decoratively effective, they beautify it in such a way as to make it harmonize with and enrich the total effect. In the eyes of the Japanese public the symbolism of their art undoubtedly forms a special element of beauty; but to the Japanese painter its chief value lies in its decorative possibilities. For the

1 A French professor states that the Japa

nese are better mathematicians than the French themselves. "The Japanese have a truly Celtic blending of idealism and logic," says an Amer

ican critic. Their literary tastes and their conduct of a campaign would confirm this.

ideas which are of primary interest to him, and which he strives to express on paper, are such as cannot be detached from their pictorial setting.

In a word, we find in the paintings of the Japanese-and this is a quality which makes them greater artists than poetsthat classic delicacy of fancy characteristic of a Greek bas-relief, or a landscape by Corot; but there is wanting every indication of that imagination which, in its romantic tendencies, shuns all definition, and refuses to be guided by rule.

The student of Japanese painting is likely to be impressed first of all by its inventive fecundity. The fertility of the Oriental mind in devising fresh and ever delightful pictorial schemes for treating even the simplest subject has, I believe, never been surpassed. I examined one day some three hundred designs in stencil collected at random in a shop in Paris, and while each that I took up seemed more beautiful than the last in its decorative arrangement, I failed to note any duplication of design. This richness of invention is seen in all forms of Jap

anese art.

Another striking quality of Japanese, as of all the best classic art is the perfection which it attains within its self-imposed limits. This perfection is due, not merely to the technical ability of the Oriental artist, which makes it possible for him to give us the peculiar pleasure which we always take in the thing most directly and perfectly expressed, but also to a very pure and delicate æsthetic feeling. The way, for instance, in which line and color, light and dark, are made to echo, and thus intensify, the dominant emotional note of a picture, illustrates the sensitiveness of this Eastern people to the most subtle æsthetic effects.

The ability to discover beauty in the simplest thing, and to express it in such a way that the emotional effect to be conveyed reaches the beholder free from any irrelevant or disturbing element, gives to Japanese pictorial treatment largeness