398 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 183. 



deserving- of such conspicuous and lasting honor? Is the 

 monument sufficiently excellent as a work of art to be 

 worthy of its subject, to satisfy the eyes of those qualified 

 to judge in such matters, and to aid in forming a correct 

 public taste ? And is it so placed that it appears to the 

 best advantage itself and in harmony with its surroundings, 

 so as to increase the general attractiveness of the spot 

 where it stands ? 



With the first of these three questions we need not 

 greatly concern ourselves. Public monuments have very 

 rarely been proposed to do honor to persons or causes 

 whose commemoration would have a bad influence upon 

 the community. We think that no such monument has 

 ever been actually erected in this country, and if a number 

 have been erected which record the existence of men in 

 whom the public take small interest, no one need object 

 to their presence for this cause alone. If a work of art is 

 good as such, we may be glad to possess it, no matter how 

 feebly our minds are impressed by the personality it por- 

 trays, or the idea it expresses. 



But the question whether or no the work of art is good 

 as such is very important, and not alone from the purely 

 artistic point of view. It is a misfortune if the eyes of the 

 people are offended, and their taste corrupted, by the con- 

 stant sight of bad works of art, but it is also a misfortune 

 when such a work persistently imprints upon the public 

 mind a weak, false, or grotesque impression of a man en- 

 titled to reverence and respect. Bad monuments, in short, 

 injure both those who look at them and those whom they 

 profess to honor. And there are many such in all our 

 cities. Who, for example, can be won to admiration of 

 the poet by the contorted, ridiculous figure which, at the 

 entrance of the Mall in the Central Park, bears the name 

 of Burns? Or who can gain a fresh sense of the services 

 that Seward rendered to the Republic by contemplating his 

 statue on Madison Square ? Farragut is really commemo- 

 rated, really honored, by the figure which stands not far 

 away from this Seward. Each time we pass it we think 

 with gratitude and admiration of him, while we receive a 

 never-failing impression of pleasure from the sight of the 

 work of art as such. Nor need it be thought that the 

 humblest among the populace are blind and deaf to the 

 difference between the aspect and message of such works 

 as these two. Hundreds of persons of all classes daily 

 stop to study the Farragut statue, while, if one watches at 

 the other end of the park, he will find that scarcely a 

 glance is ever directed to the Seward. No one points out 

 the Dodge monument on Sixth Avenue to the passing 

 stranger, and, probably, few people know even that there 

 is a bust of Washington Irving in Bryant Park, though, if 

 these were really fine works, they would be recognized, 

 like the Farragut, as among the things every visitor to 

 New York should see. St. Gaudens' statue of Lincoln not 

 only adorns the city of Chicago, and daily teaches its 

 people what sculptor's work should be, but it helps to in- 

 terpret our greatest man to the rising generation. But 

 what lessons are inculcated by the statue of Lincoln in 

 Union Square ? And who will ever care to inform himself 

 about Bolivar after seeing his equestrian figure in the 

 Central Park ? 



The proportion of bad monuments to good ones in any 

 American city to-day is probably at least ten to one. The 

 collective effect of so many poor ones in deforming our pub- 

 lic places and in discouraging, if not corrupting, the people's 

 taste for art can hardly be overestimated, and surely the 

 time has come when a more serious sense of responsibility 

 should be impressed upon those who have such matters 

 under their control. Whatever is now admitted to our 

 parks and streets is almost certain to stand there for cen- 

 turies. We cannot hope for many successful efforts like 

 that of General Custer's widow, who, a few years ago, se- 

 cured the removal of a ridiculous statue of her husband 

 from the Government grounds at West Point. The only 

 sure and sensible way to avoid bequeathing monstrosities 

 to our children is to prevent their erection. 



Adequate means toward this end have been provided as 

 regards the Central Park at least, for no monument can be 

 erected there without the permission of a committee of 

 three persons well qualified to choose among good and 

 bad works of art. Until lately, it must be said, this com- 

 mittee has consistently erred on the side of leniency. All 

 lovers of art, therefore, were gratified to learn last spring 

 that it had refused permission for the erection of a statue 

 already completed, but judged of insufficient merit. They 

 may regret that this same statue has since been set up in 

 one of our small city squares ; but it had better be there 

 than in the park, and the precedent established by its rejec- 

 tion will surely work for future good. There is no danger, 

 we believe, of over-severity in the matter. It is a painful 

 task to refuse a work which is offered by generous, well- 

 meaning citizens, and a task certain to bring a measure of 

 unreasoning public condemnation upon those who are 

 prominent in its performance. It is not likely that our 

 park will ever be deprived of a work of even a reasonable 

 degree of excellence, while it is likely that for many years 

 to come foolish and grotesque monuments will be offered 

 to it in ever-increasing numbers. We feel, therefore, that 

 this is a subject with regard to which public sentiment of 

 the right sort should be appealed to, and that the press and 

 the people ought to encourage those in charge of our public 

 places consistently to temper mercy to the artist and would- 

 be donor with justice to the people at large and the cause 

 of art. The streets and parks of a great city ought to be 

 guarded against the intrusion of bad works of art even 

 more carefully than the apartments of a public museum ; 

 for while hundreds or even thousands of persons may daily 

 visit the museum, tens of thousands must, whether they 

 will or not, daily look on objects set under the open sky. 



Black Tea and Green. 



WHAT is the difference between black tea and green 

 tea? Are they produced by different plants or 

 merely by different methods of treating the leaves? And 

 are the Oolong and Japanese teas, so popular in this 

 country, really green teas or black? One so often hears 

 these questions asked, and so seldom gets a reliable 

 answer, that our readers may be interested in the follow- 

 ing account of Japanese tea-production which we quote 

 from Mrs. Scidmore's "Jinrikisha Days in Japan." 



The Tea-plant, as every one knows, is a hardy evergreen of 

 the Camellia family. It grows a thick and solidly massed 

 bush, and, at first glance at a field regularly dotted and bor- 

 dered with the round bushes setting close to the ground, one 

 might easily mistake it for Box. In the spring the young 

 leaves crop out at the ends of the shoots and branches, and 

 when the whole top of the bush is covered with pale, golden- 

 green tips, generally in May, the first picking takes place. 

 The second picking belongs to the fire-fly season in June, and 

 after that great festival tea comes in from the plantations in 

 decreasing quantities, until the end of August. The choicer 

 qualities of tea are never exported, but consumed at home. 

 Choice basket-fired tea, such as is used in the homes of the 

 rich and well-to-do Japanese, sells for one or two dollars a 

 pound. There are choicer, more carefully grown and pre- 

 pared teas, which cost as high as from seven to ten dollars a 

 pound, but such teas are shaded from the hot suns by matted 

 awnings, and the picker, going down lines of these carefully 

 tended bushes, nips off only the youngest leaves or buds at 

 the tip of each shoot. The average tea, bought by the ex- 

 porters for shipment to the United States and Canada, is of the 

 commonest quality, and, according to Japanese trade statistics, 

 the average value is eleven cents a pound, as it stands, sub- 

 ject to the export duty and ready for shipment abroad. 



Japan tea came into market as a cheaper substitute for the 

 green teas of China, those carefully rolled Young Hysons and 

 Gunpowders of our grandmothers' fancy. Europe has never 

 received the Japan teas with favor, but the bulk of American 

 importations is Japanese. . . . For green tea, the leaves are 

 dried over hot fires almost immediately after picking, leaving 

 the theine or active principle of the leaf in full strength. For 

 black tea, the leaves are allowed to wilt and ferment in heaps 

 for from five to fourteen days, or until the leaf turns red and 

 the harmful properties of the theine have been partly destroyed. 



