POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



859 



mer for an hour. When the water, not so 

 hot but that the hand could be held comfort- 

 ably in it, had become of a muddy color, the 

 tanner took out the brains and rubbed them 

 in the palms of his hands till they were dis- 

 solved into a pasty mass. The skin was 

 hung upon a tree and wrung and twisted 

 into a hard coil, and kept in that position 

 for nearly an hour. It had then apparently 

 shrunk to two thirds of its size, and had to 

 be pulled into shape again. This done, it 

 was spread out, hair side up, and thoroughly 

 rubbed with the brain solution. The effect 

 of this was to give it softness and pliancy. 

 The skin, folded into a kind of ball, was 

 wrapped in a buffalo-robe, and exposed for 

 a few minutes to the sun, for the purpose, as 

 the Indian said, of letting " the brains go 

 well into him." It was then unwrapped 

 and spread out to dry. On the next morning 

 it had shrunken again to one third of its 

 original size, was hard, appeared almost 

 brittle, and was half-transparent. It was 

 then soaked in cold or tepid water, washed 

 and rinsed, wrung and " twisted and retwist- 

 ed upon itself " ; again stretched and manipu- 

 lated into shape, pulled this way and pulled 

 that, worked at the edges to get them limp 

 and pliant, and at the ears and the skin of 

 the legs. " But during all this time an inter- 

 esting change was coming over it : the heat of 

 an August sun was rapidly drying it, it was 

 fast coming to be of a velvet-like softness 

 throughout, and, attaining its original 6ize, 

 it was changing to a uniform pale clay- 

 color. The hair side was smooth, while the 

 inside was roughish. Indeed, in a few mo- 

 ments more it was buckskin." Then, with 

 the aid of a wooden awl, the tanner stretched 

 the skin of the neck transversely with great 

 force, cut his mark on either side near the 

 ear, and the fabric was finished and spread 

 out for its final drying. 



Architecture. — Discussing the question, 

 What style of architecture should we follow ? 

 Mr. William Simpson observes that we should 

 follow no style to copy it, or as the ultimate 

 object to be reached, but may use any style 

 with the intention of developing new forms 

 from it. A new style, if we want one — and 

 every people and every age should have its 

 own — can not be evolved out of the inner 

 consciousness of any man or any number of 



men, but is possible only by practical work- 

 ing. It can only be produced by a course of 

 development requiring time, during which 

 the requirements of the period and the build- 

 ing materials should be the dominating fac- 

 tors. This will produce the constructive 

 forms by a natural process. Then follows 

 the aesthetic or decorative function, in which 

 the artist should be a designer and not a 

 copier. Some style, however, should be taken 

 from which to start. All previous styles 

 have been developments from pre-existing 

 ones. Such has been the condition in the 

 past, and by accepting this we would not be 

 ignoring the experience of what has taken 

 place. The process of adaptation should be 

 begun by weeding out all shams. Let all 

 forms which are not suited to the present 

 wants and conditions be rejected. The same 

 should be done with all constructive forms 

 that are not natural, or which would be bad 

 building if produced with the material em- 

 ployed. No structural form should be added 

 to a building which is not required, and with 

 no other object than that of " architectural 

 effect." This has been a prolific cause of 

 shams. Such things as pinnacles, turrets, 

 towers, and all sorts of useless excrescences 

 have come into existence under this supposed 

 necessity. All decoration which is founded 

 on, or the representation of, previous con- 

 structive forms, should be rigidly avoided; 

 and originality in design should be under- 

 stood as the aim of all decorators. 



A Problem in Hnman Character. — A 



very paradoxical character is described in 

 the autobiography of Solom Maimon, " vaga- 

 bond Talmudist," and one of the most 

 learned men and sharpest casuists of the 

 Hebrew race. He appears there, according 

 to the summary of a reviewer of the work, 

 as a "skeptical rabbi, a great Talmudist 

 who despised the Talmud, an omnivorous 

 reader of all such science as in the last cent- 

 ury a Polish Jew could get hold of, a genu- 

 ine idler in literature, who, although he 

 could dash off a considerable spell of work 

 in a short time, had no work in him, had no 

 method in him, and always preferred slip- 

 shod effort to steady industry ; a man whom 

 want and misery had reduced into spasmodic 

 fits of intemperance, which rather grew 

 upon him toward the end." With all this 



