Page 55

Our Furniture, etc.
patience to think of the time that is
wasted in the long, tedious process of
modelling and carving it-to say noth-
ing of the time wasted in looking at it
when done. Isaac Newton, who per-
Iaps was a poor judge of such matters,
called the Earl of Peterboro's statues
" stone dolls;" it would be hard to tell
what he would have thought if he could
lhave seen in vision such a collection as
that in the Roman Court of the Exlhibi-
tion of 1862. The truth is, that modern
sculptors must find something to say
that the world wants and needs to hear;
and must he able to say that something
in a wvav to make the world listen to
them, if they do not wish to see their
art come to be looked upon as hardly
worthy of the name of art at all.
One word more and we have finished.
There is a work which needs to be done,
and which it surely cannot he consider-
ed derogatory to the claims of any liv-
in, sculptor to propose that he or she
should undertake; we mean the full-
length, faithful portraiture of the great
men and wvome   of our time, in their
habits as they live and move among us.
Perhaps, in the case of many of the men
who will snake the century memorable,
this duty has been done, although, even
with them , the bust is nearly all that
we have by which to remember them.
Let Miss 1losiner, or any sculptor who
will do the world service, make a mar-
ble statue of the woman who, more
than any other single person, has helped
to rid this land of the curse of Slavery
-Har riet Beecher Stowe; let her seat
her, Pen in. hand, and her great book in
manuscript on her lap, and give her to
I's and the next ages; first, an exact
Portrait of head and face-inost pre-
cious; then, from collar to shoe, hand,
foot, and every fold in her dress, just as
they are ; nobly subdued, if you will, to
the marble's law, but losing no truth
thereby-and we will thank her more
warmly and cordially than if she had
made Zenobia perfect from top to toe,
and all Aurelian's triumph from end to
end. Then, let her, humbly but proud-
ly, write " Hosmer fecit " on the hem
of the garment, and be thankful that she
has accomplished a task for which the
faithful doing might alone be fit reward.
This, then-without feeling that we
are proposing anything in the least dero-
gatory to Mliss Hiosmer's talent, or that
we are deserving less than the thanks
which are due to the giver of well-
meant, honest, and, we believe, good
advice-is what we recommend to her
and to other women who feel the desire
for work 'stirring within them ; work
other than house-keeping, sewing, cook-
iug, and mendIing, which are no more
the only tasks for wvomen than farmni ng,
wvood-chopping, eating, and d inking are
for men. Women have genius-their
own characteristic gift, and as precious
as that of men ; women have talent, as
varied and as fine as men have, and the
sam-e rule is set for the obedience of
both-that they should serve that genius
and use that talent.  Also, the same
inexorable law-inexorable, but full of
grace-sits guardian over the work of
man and woman, that they should not
mistake their powers, nor misuse them;
and it is in the belief that our country-
woman, in whose famue wefeel aarespect-
ful interest, has mistaken her powers
and is misdirecting them, that we eave
written these very frank, but very,
friendly, words.
OUR FURNITURE; WHAT IT IS, AND WHAT IT SHOULD BE.
YEIAs ago Edgar Poe published an es- in which he asserted and undertook to
Bay entitled " Philosophy of Furaiture,"*  show that the Americans
did not un-
" COlleCted Works, New York, 1S61, Vol. II  derstand furnishing their
Imouses. He
PP. 209 et seq.                      began by assuming that the English