324 
illustrate certain of these de- 
vices and also the manner 
of their use. First we have 
the milk heater, a nickel re- 
ceptacle of convenient size 
for the standard nursing 
bottle, provided with a coil 
heating element of the usual 
type. The convenience, 
cleanliness and_ practicabil- 
ity of this little apparatus 
can not be overestimated, 
and the avoidance of a hur- 
riedly lighted gas or alcohol 
flame, with the consequent 
danger of setting fire to 
something, is alone a great 
advantage. In this connec- 
tion a small water heater is 
of value in the nursery, and 
a double bottom gruel cooker will save time and trouble. 
These devices have undoubtedly proven their usefulness, 
but no less valuable in the case of the baby are the portable 
AMERICAN HOMES “AND GAR DIES 
«he Electrical Cooking and Baking Outfit 
May, 1906 
electric radiator, the coil 
bath heater, the heating pad 
and the small pressing iron. 
The latter is invaluable in 
pressing out the tiny gar- 
ments, bonnets, ribbons and 
sashes which seem to be con- 
tinually crumpled in the 
most unaccountable manner. 
The heating coil for the 
bathtub makes it possible to 
have the water at a constant 
and proper temperature, an 
operation formerly by no 
means easy to accomplish, 
while the radiator, if intelli- 
gently employed, may pre- 
vent many a cold. The 
heating pad needs little 
recommendation, not only 
as a substitute for the unwieldy hot-water bottle, but in 
general use as well, and if once used in the nursery, it will 
soon demonstrate its value. 
Decorative Painting for Americans 
stood or appreciated as decorative painting. 
In the American climate it is distinctively an 
indoor art, a circumstance that limits its en- 
joyment and gives it a quasi-private char- 
acter even when applied to a public build- 
ing. ‘Che American people, unfortunately, are not at all dis- 
posed to visit places for the inspection of art works; if a work 
of art is displayed in a public place it will be seen because one 
can not help seeing it. But unless one is really interested in 
art, interested enough to take the trouble to visit a building 
for that purpose, one will never see the wall paintings, and 
the value of such works as sources of art inspiration is com- 
paratively small. 
It is unfortunate that this should be the case, for in the 
great demands for money made upon all large American 
communities anything that is not thoroughly essential or of 
benefit to a large number of citizens is likely not to be recog- 
nized at all. And it is especially unfortunate from an art 
sense, since many of the noblest treasures of art consist of 
decorative paintings, which have given opportunities to the 
greatest of artists and have served as wonderful incentives 
to artistic endeavor in the great art epochs. We may be 
sure, also, that this endeavor was appreciated, else the ex- 
amples of this art would not be so abundant. The citizens 
of Rome, Florence, Venice and other Italian art centers un- 
doubtedly appreciated to their full value the great paintings 
which were produced in the Renaissance and with which all 
the buildings of that time were sumptuously decorated. 
Some examples of this art, some completely decorated 
buildings, we have in America, but they are few enough. The 
Library of Congress in Washington, the Appellate Court 
House in New York are the most conspicuous instances. The 
new State Capitol of Minnesota has been completed with 
a series of very notable paintings, and most public buildings 
to-day are not deemed complete without more or less of 
painted decoration. 
Thus the good work has been started and well started in 
some senses, although, as yet, most of the artists who have 
engaged in this work have completely failed to touch the 
popular mind and eye. Allegorical painting does not appeal 
to the American people. Hence the mythological pictures 
which cover the walls of the Library of Congress and of the 
Appellate Court House are far beyond the realm of popular 
imagination, and appeal more particularly to the artist on 
technical grounds—for color, drawing, composition and the 
like—matters of which the public know nothing at all and 
care very much less about. 
Descriptive, pictorial painting is needed to gain the sup- 
port of the American public—painting concerned with na- 
tional and local events, painting that seeks to tell a story, 
paintings that the unlearned can understand for what they 
represent. Already some progress has been made in this 
kind of art. The new Court House in Baltimore has some 
fine paintings of this description, and others might be named 
of the same kind. It is as easy to paint good pictures of 
this kind as the mythological and symbolic pictures in which 
our artists delight. Our painters can not expect public sup- 
port unless they paint in a language intelligible to all. The 
patriotic theme, which they have long neglected, and even 
now seem to try to neglect, is the opening wedge to the pros- 
perity the beautiful art of decorative painting is rightly en- 
titled to. 
Decorative painting for Americans is, therefore, no forced 
suggestion. If public art is to find expression in this coun- 
try in the painter’s art it must be in a language that the 
people, the unlearned, can be interested in. Knowledge of 
almost every kind must be reduced to popular limits to be 
widely useful, and this is quite as true of painting as of any 
form of intellectual endeavor. 
The patriotic theme is one of penetrating interest. The 
newly-arrived foreigner may not be aware that the statue on 
the Subtreasury in New York is George Washington, or that 
the seated figure before the Post Office in Philadelphia is 
Benjamin Franklin, or that any of the other statues in 
America are national heroes; but these sculptured forms are 
easy ways of teaching national truths. And it is equally so 
of pictured themes, even more intelligible than single fig- 
ures in the round, and much more necessary as means of 
public instruction. 
