TWENTY-FOURTH ORDINARY MEETING. 243 
mere material and hardening act of money-getting, and at the same 
time by directing our thoughts into a different course, to be a whole- 
some recreation to our minds and a means of ennobling our hearts. 
“Our long and wearisome days of business are usually spent in 
work without much change, our whole attention directed to practical 
things the poetical instincts of our natures receiving no culture, and 
so lacking development, unless quickened into life and activity by 
some powerful influence. . ‘y = 
“ Now, while not at all asserting that we should not give to our 
business the care and attention which it may need, for indeed to 
make a true success of it, it must be uppermost in our thoughts, but 
just because of that very thing, because man, by the very constitution 
of his nature, needs variety and change, or he will develop into a 
mere machine, or, perchance, his health may fail, he must become 
interested in something else. And while giving to science and 
philosophy the tribute of respect and admiration which js their 
due, I insist that poetry, that painting, that architecture, that music, 
the fine arts in fact, will appeal to something in man’s nature, which 
‘science, philosophy, the professions, or branches of mercantile indus- 
try, cannot reach. There is a part of man’s nature which responds 
to beauty as to an electric thrill.” 
Mr. Howland then gave a brief history of the “ Art of Etching ” 
as first practiced by Diirer about 1518, with its bright and its dark 
days, to its decline and comparative obscurity at the commencement 
of the present century, with its revival about 1860, and gradual 
growth in popularity to the present day. 
The practical part was then carefully described, Mr. Howland 
illustrating the processes and modes of treatment, with plates and 
implements used. ‘ Etching really means drawing upon a plate, 
generally of copper, which has previously been coated with a varnish- 
like substance called grownd, with a point which removes the varnish 
wherever it touches, and then subjecting these exposed parts to the 
biting of an acid, so as to leave actual hollows in the metal.” 
Mr. Howland mentioned the names of Haden, Hamerton, Palmer, 
Whistler, Chattock, Law, Lelanne, Méryon, Jacquemart as being 
the leading etchers in Europe. 
In America Stephen Parish, of Philadelphia, probably stands the 
highest, and we owe a great deal to such men as Henry Farrer, 
Thomas Moran, J. T. Bentley, F. 8. Church, R. 8. Gifford, Wm, 
