Imported Images

In a rough, soft wooden box in a marble dealer's store was an imago of Cupid cut from marble, chunks of wood supporting the weak and delicate TOTES. ft. ie ftopcoimon of rp.ad y-made parlor statuary," the dealer said. "It lias just arrived from Italy, and wlion dustcd, is ready for the parlor of a millionaire." "Why do you cali it ready-madr"' "The statues are all made to order, but not as the term is commonly understood. In Florence, for instance, are a number of studios over which artists of ability and repute preside. In a moment of inspiration that Cupid was conceived and modeled in clay. Good workmen, whose inspiration lasts them from twelve to fourteen hours a day, and for seven days a week, carve from the block as many copies of the model as the trade will bear. Thus the price of the inspiration may be distributed over twenty-live, flfty or one hundred Cupids. If a man should hire the sculptor to make a single image, he would pay $500, perhaps $1,000, for the inspiration, besides the price of the block aud the labor of the workman. The sculptor himself might put a file on the statute, and he might not, just as the exigencies of society permitted, or hls fancy dictatcd. "In Sicilian marble, which is an outdoor stone, we have many designs suitable for cometeries and graves. These imported goods are not only superior to. but they are cheaper than, anythingyou can get in any other way. The prices of cemetery pieces range from $100 to $500, and the parlor pieces from $150 to $1,000. The difterence bel ween these statues and those costing from two to íive times as much is siruply that these have no great sculptor's name attached. The duty on these goods was raised from ten to thirty per cent. by the latest adjustment of the tarift'. That was not to protect home inspiration, but merely as a matter of revenue. On block marble the duty was raised from fifty-eight to sixty-h've per cent. We are not quite sure why this was done, but we know it was not to protect the