Craigie (John Oliver Hobbes"). She has been to Beyreuth and returned a confirmed anti-Wagnerite. "Pantomime" is what she calle the "Ring" dramas. Her opinions (given in full in a London newspaper) are, indeed, quite severe. Of Wotan, Wagner's Jove, she says:

"Wotan is, at best, a symbol of the degenerate millionaire of modern fiction. The grandiose music assigned him accentuates, by its inappropriateness, the vulgarity of his desires; the rolls of thunder and the red lights which call attention from time to time to his supernatural state remind one of the superb intentional absurdities in Aristophanes. When Valhalla is consumed, one never for a moment believes that the calamity matters in the least-or, indeed, that there is a calamity at all. The collapse of Wotan is the collapse of a pantomime king; one waits for the harlequinade. With such a conception of omnipotence, no intellect could present, in any art, the tremendous issues between God and man. Wagner did not believe in omnipotence; he found disillusions, meanness, insufficiency everywhere; he tortured himself and tortured others by a phenominal egotism in point of view; discontent, perpetual unrest, physical anguish, unappeasable longings for everything that is not and never will be-these are in his work from beginning to end. His phrases are rarely finished; lovely at the start, they finish usually in vindictive interruptions. Impulse, caprice, and fantasy were his masters, and the early influence of a theatrical atmosphere gave him that initial love of effect and artifice, as opposed to the love of life and sincerity, which is always disastrous to an artistic temperament."

"Too stagy!" This is the phrase which this daring woman applies to the immortal Wagner as a play-wright. He thought too much of the scenery, she asserts, and the limelights and the directions.

"For instance, say that a situation is reached, the moment comes when acting is required. The performers have to followin gesture, facial expression, and tone of voice-the descriptive music. Neither inspiration nor emotion is possible to a minietic artist who is tethered, at the crucial minute, to a conductor's baton. Sincerity on the part of the actors or actresses is out of the question, and a conscientious observance of the traditional 'business' is the one thing left them. . . . As a composer, even if he has mastered the technique of Bach and covered more ground than Beethoven, Wagner has never caught the spirituality of the one nor ap proached the heights of the other. When he might have soared, he relied upon the scene painter and imitation clouds on gauze.

In the representation of nature, however, Mrs. Craigie concedes that Wagner is "supreme among the greatest." She says:

"Wagner alone has seized the music of the earth. No one else has caught and enchained forever the mysteries of life 'outdoors' the sound of wind in the trees, the fall of night on black mountains, fiercest gales, and the melancholy of sunset, the spell of a spring morning, the break of day, the madness of the storm, the flow of the river, the singing of rushes in a pool, the rage and hunger of the sea, and the wrath of the tempest. For these physical forces he shows an unerring and serene sympathy; no personal equation' disturbed his genius in this regard, or drove him, out of sheer hostility to human nature, as he found it, to utter the word too much."

No less an authority than Mme. Marcella Sembrich also indirectly criticises Wagner's music, which, she declares, is one of the reasons for the scarcity of operatic singers among the younger Italians. She says (in a recent number of The Minstrel):

"To sing Wagner's music properly a The person should shout dramatically. younger composers of Italy are all writing music of that kind. Their imitation of Wagner has led to the neglect of merely lyric singing. So we see young persons who shout Wagner and the works of the younger composers. The result is that the voice goes in a very short time. I know one young Italian who is now only a few years over 30. She is beautiful and a fine actress, but her voice is completely gone, merely be. cause she was never properly taught, and has been singing the dramatic music of Wagner. Formerly if they did not receive proper preparation there was some chance for them to learn ultimately. They began with the lyric operas of Verdi, Donizetti, and Rossini, and if they afterward learned to use their voices properly, it was not too late. The music they sang was not of a kind to injure the voice permanently. But now, when they start in on Wagner and the young dramatic composers and sing their music without knowing how to sing. the voice is gone before they realize that good singing is as necessary for one kind of music as it is for another."

A writer in The Musical Record (Arthur Weld), on the other hand, asserts "that there are no teachers of pure vocalism to-day except the Italians [using the word to express vocal method and not race], and those vocally bred in Italy" and that Italians are still able to give finer productions of Wagner's operas than the German's are in any way able to offer." (It will be interesting in this connection to reread Frank de Rialp's article, "Has Italian the Vocal Supremacy?" which appeared in WERNER'S MAGAZINE, for February, 1899.) Wagner's music, Mr. Weld contends, is only injurious to badly trained voices. On this point, he says:

perbly sung according to the highest requisites of the art of singing, and we have learned that the greatest singers may also be the greatest actors.'

The Beyreuth festival, which is one of the great artistic events of European life, began this year on July 22, and continued for one month. Here every year the chief works of Wagner are performed according to the traditions carefully preserved by his widow and his son. An American lady Miss Elizabeth Miller, who attended the festival this season, writes description of her impressions to the San Francisco Argonaut. "At 3 o'clock you are admitted to the auditorium," she says, "in worse than Egyptian darkness." This is how the opera opens:

a

"A quarter of an hour passes and a horn resounds. It plays a phrase that, to your despair-like an old acquaintance that you can not 'place'-you do not succeed in giving a name. The effect of the fanfare is magical. In five minutes every seat is occupied. Everybody stands and stares at everybody else. The boxes are swept with operaglasses to spy out the notabilities. Those blonde, soft-visaged girls, simply dressed in white, are popular German princesses. The dark eyed priest with the concentrated air, who sits on your right, is addressed by a succulent Italian voice as Caro mæstro,' and you suddenly recognize in him Don Lorenzo Perosi. A physiognomist has a fair field, for it is hard to find a more cosmopolitan fifteen-hundred anywhere. The slim, graceful, chic girls generally turn out to be Americans. Extremely attractive, as a rule, they are, doing honor to their Parisian turnersout. The kind one does not care to claim as fellow-country women are there, too. The variety of costume is amusing. Many clinging, airy organdies and gauzes, few of them semi-décolleté, are worn. Afternoon or visiting-dress prevails. But next to a 'creation' you may see a rumpled shirt-waist, a loden costume, a Mexican sombrero, or a sweater-I will admit, I only counted two of the latter.

Suddenly the lights go out, the seats clap down as if by magic, a hush falls that lasts a good five minutes, reenforced by a faintS s-s' from somewhere. Every breath is held as the first notes of the Abendmahls spruch fall on the silence. The strong points of the Beyreuth performances, as is well known, are the chorus and orchestra. this occasion Dr. Hans Richter directed with his matchless skill."

On

THE CHILD'S SENSE OF JUSTICE. The question of a child's conception of right and wrong is an interesting and important one. While it is admitted that the young child should be "commanded wisely" and not permitted to argue as to the justice of the directions given him, there is a very deep sense of justice in most children, even

at a very tender age, and this should be intelligently dealt with. To ascertain the child's conception of his rights the superintendent of schools at Westfield, N. J., (Rev. Clarence E. Brodeur), recently told the following story to the pupils of the lowest grades (we quote hereon from The Journal of Education):

"Jamie's father gave him a dog, but Jamie often forgot to feed it and the dog cried at the door. Then Jamie's father took the dog and gave it to a kind little girl who lived down the street.' Who had the best right to the dog-the father, Jamie, or the little girl, and why? The results are shown in the following table:

"Almost 64 per cent. of the children would give the dog to the little girl,-57 per cent. of the boys and 70 per cent. of the girls being of this opinion. At ten years of age 85 per cent. of the girls make this choice, and at all ages the number of girls who favor the little girl of the story is greater than the number of boys. The feeling that the girl is kinder than the boy is clearly evi dent to the girls, especially at eleven years of age; to the boys this sentiment does not appeal with much force, and it steadily decreases as the age of the boys increases.

Nearly 28 per cent. of the children would give the dog to the father, and of this percentage the boys lead the girls at all ages; the opinion seems to be held by about a third of the boys and with but little variation between the ages of five and thirteen, -the ages of the children taking this test. father did what he had a right to do because he bought the dog. Why shouldn't he give it away if he thought best?' This is the substance of the reasons given by more than a half of those who recognize the father's right.

The

'Very few of the children have much respect for the rights of Jamie; evidently the sympathy of the children for the sufferings of the dog have led most of them to the opinion that Jamie has forfeited whatever right he may originally have had.

It is a fact of some interest that while more than half of the boys and of the girls advise giving the dog to the little girl, the sentiment is very much stronger among the girls than among the boys; and that of those children who would give the dog to Jamie or to the father, the sentiment is much stronger among the boys than among the girls.'

THE EYE, CHARACTER AND EXPRESSION.

The eye as an indicator of character is the subject of an editorial in The Phrenological Journal, from which we take the following:

Blue eyes are said to be the weakest. Upturned eyes are typical of devotion.

Wide open eyes are indicative of rash

ness.

Side glancing eyes are always to be distrusted.

Brown eyes are said by oculists to be the strongest.

Small eyes are commonly supposed to indicate cunning.

The proper distance between the eyes is the width of one eye.

Eyes in rapid and constant motion betoken anxiety, fear, or care.

Eyes with long, sharp corners indicate great discernment and penetration.

The white of the eye showing beneath the iris is indicative of nobility of character, Gray eyes turning green in anger or excitement are indicative of a choleric temperament.

When the upper lid covers half or more of the pupil the indication is of cool deliberation.

Unsteady eyes, rapidly jerking from side to side, are frequently indicative of an un

settled mind.

It is said that the prevailing colors of eyes among patients of lunatic asylums are brown or black.

Eyes of any color with weak brows and long, concave lashes are indicative of a weak constitution.

Eyes that are wide apart are said by physiognomists to indicate great intelligence and tenacious memory.

Eyes of which the whole of the iris is visible belong to erratic persons, often with a tendency toward insanity.

When the under arch of the upper eyelid is a perfect semicircle it is indicative of goodness, but also of timidity, sometimes approaching cowardice.

All men of genius are said to have eyes clear, slow moving, and bright. This is the eye which indicates mental ability of some kind, it does not matter what.

The eye, however, has of itself no expression. According to an English oculist, it is the eyelid that is the expressive part. The eye itself, he declares, has no more expres sion than a glass marble. We find an interview with this daring man of science in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, from which we quote:

"How do you explain the fact that the eyes of one person are more expressive than those of another?' I am asked. They are not. The difference consists in certain nervous contractions of the lids peculiar to the individual.

"Observe for yourself, and you will see that I am right. We will say that I am greatly interested in something, and my at tention is suddenly called from it by an un

expected interruption. My upper eyelid raises itself just a little, but the eye proper does not change an iota in appearance. If the interruption is but momentary, the elevation of the lid will be but momentary. If the surprise caused by an interruption is continued the lid may be raised even a little more, and, in fact, the whole of the forehead, including the eyebrows, is raised and wrinkled. But the eye remains the same.

"When a person is excited much the same emotions are gone through. His eyes are open wide, in cases of intense excitement, to their greatest extent, but the forehead is not wrinkled, and the ball of the eye is as expressive as a bit of glass. No more.

Observe the face of one who laughs. You will see that the lower eyelid has no muscle of its own, and it is only by the contraction of the adjacent muscles in smiling That or laughing that it is made to move. is why there are many wrinkles about the eyes of merry persons.

"The expression of deep thoughtfulness is produced by the drooping of the upper lid. The lids of some persons fall so low that the pupil of the eye itself is the same. If the meditation is over a subject that worries the thinker the expression is again quite different. The eyelids contract and the eyebrows are lowered and drawn together. This is true of a reflective mood.

"As to emotional moods, there is the expression of anger, for instance. The eyes, instead of closing, are open wider than they are normally, but the brows are closely knit.

"In expressing sadness the entire upper eyelid comes about half-way down and the folds of the skin collect there, giving the lid a thick, heavy appearance.'

PERSONAL CLEANLINESS AND THE VOICE.

While enumerating certain widely recognized means of improving the natural voice, such as proper breathing exercises, general physical culture and good diet, George Ruskin Phoebus mentions another help which is not so generally kept in mind. He says (in Physical Culture for October).

"It seems almost superfluous to state that cleanliness of the body is an important feature in voice-culture, and yet, in order that this very important item to every condition of good health may not be overlooked, it is repeated. No person is ever possessed of a good, strong, resonant and healthy voice whose digestive organs do not perform their functions regularly and whose blood is not in constant and proper circulation, and no one can keep their digestive organs properly regulated nor can they retain healthy circulation of the blood if they neglect the important element of cleanliness of the exteri. or anatomy. The bath, therefore, and a proper amount of healthful exercise of all the muscles of the body is absolutely essential to the possession of a rich and resonant and thoroughly natural voice,"

A PERMANENT DEWEY ARCH.

The movement among artists and art lovers generally to perpetuate the Dewey ceremonials in this city by erecting a permanent arch, is progressing. According to

the statement of Charles H. Nicoll, secretary of the citizens' committee, more than $100,000 has already been subscribed for that purpose. The question of site for the permanent arch is the principal one agitating the movers; some advocating the pres ent location, others urging Riverside Drive, near Grant's tomb. In speaking of the arch as a triumphal monument, Charles H. Coffin says (in Harper's Weekly):

"Triumphal arches have been raised before now, and sculptors have decorated them. The initiative has come from the municipality or the people. But when did a body of artists, unsolicited, come forward with so elaborate a scheme, and render its acceptance almost a matter of course by making a present of their services. A mere suggestion to the authorities would probably have carried little weight. It is to the credit of the national sculpture society that, together with generous enthusiasm, it had the shrewd business sense to see that a definite scheme must be presented, and the ways and means of executing it made clear. While every one else was beating the air with hints and admonitions, the society acted.

"The architect of the scheme is Mr. Charles R. Lamb. He took as his model the arch of Titus, but has introduced many modifications to meet the specific requirements of the site. The design affords scope for liberal embellishment with sculpture. That was intentional. The society meant it to be a sculptors' gift, and to give opportunity for as many of its members as possible to be represented. The roll of honor, which includes twenty-eight names, is as follows: J. Q. A. Ward, the president of the society; Philip Martiny, Karl Ritter, Charles H. Niehaus, Daniel C. French, William Couper, Johannes Gelert, R. Hinton Perry, Isidore Konti, Henry Baerer, C. F. Ha. mann. Ralph Goddard, Frederick Moynihan, F. R. Kaldenberg, Caspar Buberl, E. C. Potter, H. K. Bush-Brown, George T. Brewster, T. S. Clarke, J. J. Boyle, J. S. Hartley, H. A. Lukeman, W. O. Partridge, E. P. Proctor, F. W. Ruckstuhl, George E. Bissell, Charles Lopez, and Herbert Adams. Each of these sculptors executed his model in the small. This was cast in plaster, and then enlarged by assistants employed at the charge of the city."

Charles de Kay advocates the present site for the permanent arch. He thinks it

"will gain in effect by remaining in the heart of the city, where all processions will of necessity pass beneath it, and only follow ancient precedent by standing near buildings of varied size."

The classic form of the arch he considers an advantage from both an artistic and a popular standpoint. On the latter view he says (in the New York Times' Review of Books and Art):

"The educated public takes pleasure in a classic form, owing to early associations with Latin history and art, while the uneducated are subdued to speechless admiration by the marvelous spirit of ancient architecture. It is with our arch as it was with the architecture at the World's Fair. As a good lady visiting Chicago from a thinly settled Western State quaintly remarked when she stood for the first time in the Court of Honor:

Now I know what the Heavenly Jerusalem may be like!' The Madison Avenue arch simply crushes people who have never seen those of Europe-and pleases those who have."

EVILS OF " HUSTLING."

Every evil has its denouncer. The rush, nurry, fret and worry of this age, is calling forth warnings and homilies innumerable, the gist of most of them being that worry is harmful, does no good, and is not necessary. In a recent issue of Eleanor Kirk's Idea, we find a little sermon preached on the text: "If you can't be aisy, be as aisy as you can." Says the Idea, in part:

"Up to date no man has yet lived. He has stayed a little while in pain and perplexity, and then given it up as a bad job. With their inherited beliefs I think these sojourners have done remarkably well to stick it out as long as they have, and I wish them every success wherever they are. Just think of how few suicides there have been in proportion to the population of suffering people. This of itself is proof of the omnipotent power of life.

"In all ages people have cultivated disease instead of ease, and this is what is, and what always has been, the matter with the whole human family. We have had every kind of 'nation and 'ology from vaccination to bacteriology, and there isn't a thing that is grewsome and horrible that has been left out of the catalogue; and some men and women have sat out the performance from forty to eighty years.

"There can be no true growth without comfort, notwithstanding all that has been said on the subject of discipline. If our hands are clenched with pain or with nervous tension of a false economy we can not grasp and appropriate the good things that are ours in such beautiful abundance. Then after a while we get so accustomed to tightening our muscles and our purse strings, at the same time allowing the emotions to govern the reason, that the result is a conglomeration of mush and steel like rigidity. And then comes paralysis or a cerebral breakdown.

"Here is a fine formula for health and longevity:

We may add here the words of the satirist who expresses himself in The Family Doctor. Says he:

"Man's business requireth haste. The average business and professional man eats in a hurry and gets dyspepsia. He walks in a hurry and gets apoplexy. He talks in a hurry and gets the lie. He does business in a hurry and becomes a bankrupt. He reads in a hurry and is superficial. He votes in a hurry and produces corruption. He marries in a hurry and gets a divorce. He trains his children in a hurry and develops spendthrifts and criminals. religion in a hurry and hurry. He makes his leaves a legal contest. and goes to the devil. ily increases!

"

He gets forgets it in a great will in a hurry and He dies in a hurry And his tribe stead

THE MEXICAN STAGE AND ITS FAVORITES.

The stage in Mexico, as might be expected from the pleasure-seeking, music-loving characteristics of the race, leans toward comedy and music to such an extent that a combination of these two form the chief class of theatrical entertainment. The Mexican variety of comic opera, known as Zarzuela, is, however, of wider scope than ours. In an article on the Mexican stage (in the October Cosmopolitan) Thomas Brown says:

"Zarzuela is of two classes, the genero chico and the genero grande, the former generally consisting of one act of a light, order embellished with catchy music, the latter usually of three acts with a more serious motif, and at times, though rarely, approaching the tragic. The genero chico in duration can be compared to the curtainraiser of our own stage; and in turn, according to its class, if there be any distinct subclasses, contains from one to six parts, depending upon whether an attempt be made toward spectacular effect or not. A production consisting of four tandas (acts), each a complete play within itself, and taking in all more than four hours to present, would make for us, even though of the best, a rather long and wearisome performance. The management, however, offers to sell tickets for all ordinary occasions por tandas' (by acts) at the modest price of twenty-five cents each, and offers a varied program suited to all tastes. Upon special occasions, such as Thursday and Sunday matinees, Sunday nights and feast-days, is given a function corrida (undivided show)."

44

Personally 'la Soler' is possessed of that quality expressed so aptly by the Spanish adjective simpatica' and indefinable in English except by the word 'magnetic.' I can not think of an American counterpart of her except Della Fox in her palmy days, and such a comparison is far-fetched. The possessor of a delicate beauty and charm, and a voice of light timbre, which, while exceedingly pleasant, gives a suggestion of an imperfect training, she plays chula (pretty, but of the people) parts as no one else can, and all other parts she invests with a charming personality."

Rosa Fuertes is another star:

"She is essentially an actress of strongly emotional parts, somewhat suggestive of masculinity in bearing, having what an artist friend calls strong lines in her face.' The possessor of a beautiful soprano voice, she fits the parts in which Soler is found lacking."

American companies have always played to large audiences in Mexico, says Mr. Brown. He recalls the fact that Patti always considered Mexico City one of her best engagements.

WHAT ARE WE DOING WITH SUNDAY?

In these days of Sunday holidays, Sunday excursions, Sunday golf games, Sunday dinner parties and dances, is not the rest idea, the æsthetic benefit, of the Seventh day being lost sight of? The secularization of Sunday and its results on national life is considered by F. W. Farrar, in the October Forum. In general, says this writer:

"I should regard it as nothing less than a national misfortune if Sunday became more and more secularized; if public worship became more and more neglected; if frivolous personal amusement became the one transcendent end of a day granted us as a boon. It was given us for rest indeed-which is most necessary, but is by no means best secured by indiscriminate pleasure seeking -but also to secure for deliverance from merely earthly interests and all enslaving routine; and for calm amid constantly recurring excitement; and for special opportunities for receiving good ourselves, and