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There is a very easy way to measure the height of a wall or tree - a method that anyone can use if he or she can do a problem in simple proportion. It is necessary that the sun should be shining at the time and that a shadow should be cast. That is all that is required to do this easy problem.

Suppose that you wish to measure a tree and that the sun is shining; then the shadow of the tree is cast on the ground. You must measure the distance from the tip of the shadow to the place right under the top of the tree. If the top point of the tree is right above the middle of the trunk, you must calculate half the diameter of the trunk in making your measurements.

Suppose that the distance from the point of the shadow to the trunk of the tree is 40 feet, and that the tree is 2 feet thick. Then the total distance is 41 feet (40 feet + half the diameter of the tree). Now take a stick of which you know the exact length. Suppose that it is 3 feet long.

Hold this upright with one end on the ground, and notice how far its shadow extends. You will find, perhaps, that it is 6 feet long. Multiply the length of the tree’s shadow (41 feet) by the length of the stick (3 feet); divide by the length of the stick’s shadow (6 feet). This gives 20.5; that is, the tree is 20.5 feet high.

You can also get the answer, though not quite so correctly, by seeing how many steps it takes to go from the edge of the shadow to the tree, being careful to make your steps as nearly equal as possible. Then, after measuring the length of one step, multiply its length by the number of steps. This is the distance from the shadow’s edge to the tree.

Be sure that you take the distance to a point right under the highest point. If it is a church spire, for example, make allowance for the distance between the wall up to which you measure and the center of the church tower topped by the spire.

The popularity of tropical fishes is due to various reasons. For one thing you will have a constant source of delight in their gorgeous coloring, which includes all the colors of the rainbow mixed together in profusion. Again, the remoteness of their origins adds a romantic interest to these beautiful little fish. Nor is it difficult to keep them, for they adapt themselves beautifully to home aquaria (an aquarium is a tank for marine animals; the plural is aquaria).

Tropical fishes may be divided into two groups, the live-bearers, which as the name implies bear their young alive, and the egg- layers, which reproduce through eggs. The first kind, the live-bearers, may be found in great numbers and many varieties in our own hemisphere. The other group of fish, the egg- layers, includes many more varieties and these are found in many parts of the world.

Tropical fish have been bred in such large numbers in this country that the number imported has been continually decreasing. Generally speaking, only the rarer species are now imported.
While almost all the small tropical fishes can be kept in home aquaria, there are some important rules that must be observed if the fish are to be kept in good condition.

For one thing, since fish have a soft mucous coat over their scales to protect them against bacteria, the water must be soft or this mucous coat will be destroyed with consequent harm to the fish. If the tap water is too hard, rain-water or water from a pond may be used. Furthermore the water should be kept sweet by healthy plants, which liberate oxygen and absorb gases that are harmful to the fishes.

An aquarium of five, ten or fifteen gallon capacity should have enough coarse sand to cover the bottom to a depth of at least an inch. It should be placed near a window, so that the plants will have sufficient light. Better results may be obtained by using artificial light from a reflector that fits over the top of the tank. A reflector of this sort concentrates the light on the fish and plants and brings out the best coloring of both. Besides, artificial light supplies a steady, dependable source of light. An ordinary 40-watt incandescent lamp will suffice for a io-gallon tank and a 50-watt lamp for a x-gallon tank. This artificial light should operate at least eight hours a day.

An important thing to remember is that most tropical fishes are jumpers and that many of them could easily leap from the average aquarium. To keep them from doing so, place a glass cover (window glass will do) over the entire aquarium. This glass will also keep out dust and other foreign matter. Be sure that the glass cover fits loosely, so that air can easily enter the aquarium.

The plants called Vallisneria, Sagittaria Sinensis, Sagittaria Subulata, hairgrass and spatterdock may be put in the aquarium. Remember that the front center of the aquarium should be left free of plants so that you may be able to observe the fish without difficulty.

When you have put the plants into the tank, a period of three days should elapse before you introduce the fish into the aquarium. This three-day interval will give the plants a chance to grow, and the chlorine that is often present in water for purifying purposes will have disappeared. As this chlorine is harmful to fishes, they should not be placed in fresh tap water.

When the water in the tank has been well conditioned, it is time to stock the aquarium with fish. In order to have enough oxygen for the fish, not more than two fish per gallon should be put into a tank. A good collection to start with would be a pair each of Angel Fish, Red Platies, Zebras, Black Mollies and Guppies.

The Angel Fish is noted for its haughty, dignified manners. The black vertical bars across the body contrast beautifully with the underlying silver-green. The Red Platy is a beautiful fish, vividly colored. The young in some strains are gold in color but become blood red as they reach maturity. The Zebra is the most peaceful of all aquarium fishes. Though it may chase other fishes, this is due only to its habit of swimming in schools. If there are no other Zebras in the tank, it will follow the fish of different species. The Black Molly is the only fish suitable for aquarium purposes that is entirely black.

Perhaps you may want to start a colony of Guppies. This exquisite little fish is very popular with fish fanciers. Its coloring has been described as “every color combined into one harmonious whole.”

Fish do not require much food and are not very particular eaters. Any prepared food, which you may buy at your dealer’s, will answer the purpose. It is well to use two or more foods alternately and occasionally to feed a little cooked spinach to the live-bearers. Live foods, such as mosquito larv and small worms, are good; these too may be bought at your dealer’s.

Do not overfeed the fishes. The food which is not eaten lies on the bottom of the tank and decomposes, causing the water to become cloudy. Harmful gases will be formed and the water will become deficient in oxygen. Overfeeding may be avoided by feeding no more than your fish will eat in ten or fifteen minutes. If food is left after that time, you have fed too much. It would be well not to feed the next day, and to feed less thereafter. Feeding once a day is usually enough.

Snails are useful scavengers in an aquarium; they consume surplus food and decaying vegetation. The Red Ramshorn Snail is a favorite with fish fanciers. Its red shell and body make an effective contrast with the green vegetation of the aquarium. Other species of snails that are used a scavengers are the Australian Red Snail, the Pond Snail and the Trumpet Snail.

Tropical fish require a water temperature of from 70 to 8o degrees. Since variation in temperature is one of the chief sources of trouble in an aquarium, everything possible should be done to avoid or minimize this variation. It would be well to have a heater that will supply heat along the bottom of the tank. If you cannot obtain a heater for the aquarium, cover the tanks on cold nights with a blanket or other cloth covering.

In spite of all your precautions, fish may sometimes become sick. The most common fish disease is White Spots or Icli. The word Ich is really the shortened form of Ichiyophthira, a tiny parasite that causes the disease. Ich is characterized by pinched fins and white spots on the body and fins. It is best to remove the affected fish from the aquarium and to place it in a separate container. Some common salt or patent fish remedy should then be added to the water. The tiny white spots should disappear in about a week.

Another common disease is Tailrot or Fungus. The fungus is a white scummy coating that may be found on many parts of the fish. The affected fish should be placed in clean water to which some salt has been added. Swabbing the affected parts with cotton soaked in mercurochrome or vinegar is effective.

When plants and food are placed in the aquarium, fish enemies may be introduced with them: such enemies as the diving beetle larva, the larv of various dragon flies and the water scorpion. It would be well to consider all unknown bugs and larv that are found in the aquarium as fish enemies.

There are kinds of wood that will not rot away, even though they are kept in water. The city of Venice is built on wooden piles buried in the shallow sea, and these have lasted for many centuries.

We shall guess what it is that makes wood rot when we learn what is done to protect wood that must be exposed to wet, for instance, the wood of which railway ties are made. These are often soaked with a chemical substance called creosote; and the particular property of creosote which makes it so valuable is that it is poisonous to microbes. So the answer to the question, in one word, is: Microbes. Wood will not rot if it is charged with something that kills microbes, or if, as in the case of Venice, it is protected from microbe enemies by being kept in salt water.

If you live in the southern United States, or have visited there, you have seen swamps with bald cypress trees growing in them. Cypress wood is remarkably hard and resists attacks of insects and microbes. The wood of the bald cypress, which grows in the swamps, is used for railway ties, fence posts, telegraph poles, piles for docks and other purposes for which a water-resistant wood is needed. From pine wood, which contains much creosote, we get wood tar that is applied to other woods to protect them.

Perhaps you have seen a hay fever sufferer, in the summer, sneezing violently and showing every sign of a serious cold. Hay fever is not a cold. It is not caused by a germ, but by the pollen of some plant, carried by the wind against the over-sensitive membranes of eye, nose and throat of the sufferer. It comes usually to people who, besides having sensitive mucous membranes, are tired or nervous; and every attack makes the sufferer more liable to another. Several plants such as goldenrod, dandelion and ragweed are chief offenders in causing hay fever.

Various cures have been attempted. The best cure is removal to the mountains or to the seashore, far away from the pollen. Various drugs, including cocaine, have proved helpful; but the effect of these is only temporary. Sometimes relief is provided by cauterizing the sensitive area of the mucous membrane. Some doctors inoculate the patient in order to build up resistance to the disease. Another method of warding off hay fever is to wear a mask provided with a filter in all areas where pollen is apt to be carried about by the wind.

Hay fever belongs to the family of allergic diseases, in which a person becomes ill because of special sensitivity to a certain food or drug or heat or cold or pollen or dust or even sunlight. Here is a remarkable illustration of the old adage that “one man’s meat is another man’s poison.” In no case is this truer than in the case of allergy.

The painter’s original color chart might well have been the rainbow, and while we can not make colors more beautiful than those we see in the sky, we can imitate them with pigments. A pigment, taking its name from the Latin pingere, to paint, is a coloring material. Many pigments are found in Nature. Yellow ochre, for example, is a clay dug from the earth. Cobalt blue comes from a mine in the form of ore. Plants and trees supply us with a variety of natural pigments. On the other hand, coal tar is an example of artificial coloring material from which the great group of aniline dyes is developed.

Yellow ochre is one of the simplest pigments to obtain, yet neither the house painter nor the artist could use it in its raw state. Were we to spread yellow ochre on the side of a house, the first good rain would wash it off. But if we mix it with linseed oil, we get oil paint, which will hold. If we combine it with glycerin and gum arabic, we have a water-color paint; if we mix it with chalk or wax, we obtain pastels and crayons. In all cases the pigment is the same, while the mixing materials differ in accordance with the use intended for them. Today, colors come ready-made, but once the painter had to be his own chemist.

On top of a lofty hill, near Lake Wales, Florida, in a park and bird sanctuary, stands a beautiful tower 205 feet high, a shaft of color rising above the green of the surrounding forest. It is built of Florida stone and pink Georgia marble.

Round the tower at the top is a marble band on which are carved flamingos, cranes and other birds native to Florida. The grillwork at the windows represents animals and plants of Florida. The brass door tells the story of the world’s creation as it is reported in the Bible. Surrounding the tower is a moat, crossed by marble drawbridges and lengthening in front into a mirror-like pool.

In the tower are seventy-one beautifully toned bells forming one of the largest carilIons (sets of chimes) in the world. Four times a week the carillon-master gives public recitals and visitors come from all over the state to listen to these magnificent concerts.

The Singing Tower and the bird sanctuary in which it stands were presented to the people of the United States on February r, 1929, by Edward W. Bok, a philanthropist who started life as a poor immigrant boy from the Netherlands and rose to great wealth in America. Mr. Bok died in 1930, and lies buried in a crypt at the base of the tower.

When a hot current of air passes between an object and our eyes, the object appears to quiver. It is only an appearance, however, and the phenomenon is one out of many illustrations of the fact that the eyes are very easily deceived. This is what happens. The air is a mixture of gases, and gas, like other things, expands when heated. It becomes lighter in density; the same bulk is now lighter.

When light is passing through a gas, it travels in a straight line as long as the gas remains of exactly the same density.

Whenever the density changes, light alters its course. Therefore, when hot currents come between an object and our eyes, the light coming from the object, and passing through the hot air which is continually changing in density, is bent this way and that. So it comes about that the eye, instead of seeing the object stationary, as it really is, sees it wobbling because the light is made to wobble by the changing temperature of the air.

Scientists term this bending of light, when it passes from one density to another, refraction. This refraction plays a large part in matters of sight. It is by taking advantage of this peculiarity of light that we are able to make all sorts of valuable optical instruments, including magnifying glasses, microscopes, telescopes, cameras, sextants and so on. All these are based on refraction, or light-bending.

If we put down the loud pedal of a piano (so raising the dampers), and then sing a steady note, we find that the piano also begins to sing. There is a very interesting reason why. We hear sounds because of blows on the drums of our ears. These eardrums are membranes stretched across the ear passage as parchment is stretched across a drum. If anything beats on this drum, the vibrations of the membrane are communicated to the brain and we hear sound.

Irregular vibrations of the air cause us to hear sounds we call noises, as, for example, when we knock over a chair. If the air is made to move in regular waves by regular vibrations, we hear a pleasing sound which we call a musical note. Thus, when a bow is drawn by an experienced hand across a violin string, the string vibrates regularly, and the air is set into a regular wave-motion. This wave-motion reaches our ears and causes the drums to vibrate accordingly. So it is with the piano string, which is set vibrating by being hit with a felt-covered hammer when we strike the appropriate key.

When we sing into the piano, we set up waves of sound in the air, and the particular string of the piano which is of a length to correspond with the note we sing begins to vibrate, and therefore to give out sound. But only the notes we sing will answer us. All the others remain silent, because their wave-length is not the wave-length we have set up. It is exactly the same principle that is used in wireless telegraphy, but in that case the waves are not sound-waves or airwaves, but electric waves in the ether.

His use of chiaroscuro (values of light and shade) is peculiarly his. By it he produces the feeling of form, and of more than form; in the faces he has recorded we perceive more than features copied in color. We get a glimpse into the real being beneath the flesh and blood. “The heads are enveloped in darkness, out of which emerge the features, the eyes especially arresting the attention. Through the depth and poignancy of their gaze one seems to look into the very soul of the subject.”

The greatest art is never merely photographic. Genius sees a plain street of ordinary houses with one crooked chimney, perhaps, reaching toward the stars, and paints the scene so that this is the .road to El Dorado, and coming and going along it are beautiful fancies that touch us with golden finger-tips in passing.

This separate eye of genius is one of the world’s most precious possessions. Rembrandt was always conscious of his own secret vision. He had the clear insight of the artists of Holland into the beauty of everyday things and people, and if he had been just a Dutch master and not a world genius, he would have found an infinite satisfaction in painting faithfully scenes from his native land. As it was, the perfection which was the goal of the Dutch artists was his starting-point. He took for granted the things everyone else saw, and concerned himself with what they did not see his secret.

In the same way Michelangelo took the perfection of the human form for granted, and built up his own world of men and women as he saw them - humanity invested with something of the largeness and strangeness of divinity.

Rembrandt Harmensz Van Rijn could not conceive of working in any other way than his own. From the first he was very sure of his ability, and at eighteen - an age when most artists were still at the apprentice stage - he took a studio of his own and announced himself an artist. His father, a miller, had sent the boy, while he was still young, to a Latin school, to prepare for Leyden University. After a year of schooling there Rembrandt showed so plainly that art, and not letters, was his calling that his parents apprenticed him to a Leyden painter called Swanenborch.

There for three years Rembrandt studied drawing and painting; after that he went to Amsterdam to work with Last- man, a Dutch artist who had studied in Italy and was much influenced by Caravaggio, the realist. For six months the youth worked with this painter; then quite suddenly he threw down his brush and went home, saying he was going to work in his own way.

THE TIRELESS GENIUS WHO MADE NINE HUNDRED MASTERPIECES

This faith in himself was justified. In 1631, after three years of private study, Rembrandt, then about twenty-five years old, went to Amsterdam and there began a career of most amazing industry. He painted portraits and pictures for the wealthy, and made etchings for his poorer patrons. Apart from those which have been lost, and his earlier studies which he himself destroyed, this marvelous artist executed six hundred pictures and three hundred etchings. He seems never to have had an idle moment; in the earlier years of his profession he must have lived with an etcher’s needle in his hand and a copperplate before him; and to this passion for the engraved line, and Rembrandt’s determination to be himself and express that which he saw in his own way, the artist owes his place as the greatest etcher and one of the greatest painters the world has known. At the age of twenty-four he had “left himself no room for improvement” in the art of etching.

HOW REMBRANDT LEARNED TO PAINT THE THOUGHT BEHIND THE SMILE

In the course of his life Rembrandt painted and drew a variety of subjects, but all his interests really focused on the human face. His own eye was sensitive to the faintest shadow of change passing over a man’s countenance.

Knowing so much and seeing so much, he made haste to record it. His father and mother, who must have been patient souls, allowed themselves to be drawn a great many times in all the moods and tempers which either the accident of the moment or their son’s despotic will dictated. Or he would use himself as a model, sitting before his copperplate, needle in one hand, mirror in the other.

Thus he drew his own face repeatedly, serious or smiling, “the artist with frightened eyes,” “the artist with a scarf round his neck” and “the artist” in many other varieties of costume.

There were two far-reaching effects of this tireless industry: one was Rembrandt’s ability to render easily every conceivable expression of the face, the other was a supreme mastery of technique.

THE WONDERFUL ETCHING OF THE 1ST RAISING OF LAZARUS

If we look at his large etching The Raising of Lazarus we shall see there surprise, consternation and other natural emotions drawn on men’s faces in a way that is unrivaled in the story of art. It is not an easy or manufactured emotion that the artist shows: each man seems amazed or horrified in his own peculiar way, as his character dictates. We can almost follow the men home and hear them talk about the miracle to their friends.

A similar interest is attached to what is perhaps the most famous etching in the world - Christ Healing the Sick, known as The Hundred Guilder Piece. The artist never quite finished this etching, but as it stands it is a study we should not weary of looking at. On each of the faces Rembrandt has stamped the individual soul. The draftsmanship is superb; not a line is wasted. When, not long since, there came to light an old collection including a number of Rembrandt etchings, three of these, a fine impression of The Hundred Guilder Piece and two others, were sold at nearly $6,000 each.

THE MASTER’S TOUCH THAT MAKES A PICTURE SEEM TO LIVE

Rembrandt’s technique was a separate gift. At first his line was a little tight and hard, as in the early etching of himself about the age of twenty-one. Presently it became loose and vibrating, very gentle and very strong at the same time, as in the incomparable etchings of his mother. As his line loosened, his brush work loosened also; at times he has the freedom of Velasquez, that supreme genius of technique.

Technique in drawing and painting, as we know, is the craft of art; that is to say, a person without any vision of beautiful things may be able to draw a perfect line. With some artists technique is the beginning and end of their peculiar gift. Very often too much attention to the technique will kill the freedom and spontaneity of the artist’s thought. Technique is concerned mainly with two problems: outline and shade masses. An outline is really false to nature; faces can no more be truly represented by an outline than an orange can be represented by a circle.

The only true rendering of solid objects is in modeling or sculpture. But there are degrees by which the outline can attain to the qualities of sculpture. That is to say, a great master can, by a single outline, give the illusion of a rounded form. Generally speaking, the tighter a line is, the farther it is from representing a solid object. Michelangelo’s cartoons or sketches, Goya’s drawings and Rembrandt’s etchings will show us what. a loose, vibrating line is.

THE GREAT GIFT AND DEEPEST SECRET OF REMBRANDT

The dealing with masses, showing light and shade, is another and stouter problem. If you look at a person’s face, particularly in lamp-light or candle-light, you will see that part of the features, the nose or the cheek bones or the chin, are very clearly in high light; other parts of the face are very clearly in shadow. If a face were made like a solid cube there would be an end of the matter. Anyone who can draw at all can draw or paint the high lights or the strong shadows on a face; that which artists spend years in trying to render is the part where high light slips into dark shadow; the tiny planes on the rounded flesh that join up the two extremes of white and black.

Here Rembrandt’s technique was superb. A few lines, a little work of the brush, and he was across that terrible no man’s land which many artists never cover at all. Leonardo da Vinci was another genius who had mastered this most difficult problem in portraiture.

But when we think of Rembrandt’s art from the point of view of characterization, great as it is, or of its marvelous technique, we have not touched his outstanding genius. Rembrandt got into his work a luminosity - very different from actual light-and-shade treatment - which has never been found either in etchings or paintings before or since. In etching “no other master ever made white paper radiate as he did.” This luminous atmosphere in his etching and in his painting—was Rembrandt’s secret, his genius, his gift to the world.

Anyone can make light, light and darkness dark. Rembrandt made his darks glow with light, his lights hold a peculiar soft gloom. “He surrounded centres of light with waves of darkness. The darkness itself in his pictures is transparent; you can peer into it and discover half- concealed forms; everything provokes curiosity; there is mystery; and it acts upon the mind so that the real and the imaginary become mingled. It is at once a reality and a dream!’ A secret that can be told is no longer a secret. To attempt to explain Rembrandt’s supreme genius is as difficult as it is to copy it. In some moods he seems to have tried to use light as actual material with which to build form; he seems to have composed in light.

The Venetians got light into their pictures, and often a gentle suavity; but they were painters willfully making beautiful things a little more beautiful painters dealing with subjects of religious or classic story that were already full of ‘interest in men’s minds and only needed to be painted to become adored.

HOW REMBRANDT LOVED TO PAINT THE PEOPLE OF HOLLAND

When Rembrandt painted a religious subject he often gave it a genre feeling. For instance, in a Holy Family, now in Munich, he represents the father and mother in a Dutch home, bending over a familiar Dutch cradle in which lies the Babe. And instead of gods and princes, queens and nymphs, this artist chose for the figures in most of his pictures humbler folk, sometimes the ragged and poor. Yet there is nothing commonplace in these creatures, for the man who put them on canvas or paper saw human beings in a broad, sympathetic way, and gave character and dignity to their forms and faces when he drew or painted them. A gesture or a turn of the head might have the force of presenting some universal truth.

Not only the number of Rembrandt’s works but the wide variety of subjects and kinds is astonishing. Of them all, as we have said, the portraits are of most importance and interest. True as likenesses, expressing the characteristics of each individual, they are interesting as pictures, too. Some of his portraits of old women are unequaled in the way they embody the calm dignity and courage of age, and record the traces of experience - the fruit of living. Stiffness and firmness may still be there, but sharpness has been smoothed away by the touch of time. Into just the folded, quiet hands of an old woman Rembrandt could put such beauty and meaning that the sight of them almost brings tears of tenderness. A transparent delicacy or a sturdy capableness gives them distinction and suggests what part they have played in a long lifetime. No other has been so sympathetic a painter of old age. It is the impression made upon the painter himself that comes to us through the picture he made. We see his beloved young wife Saskia, or his good friend Jan Six, or his son Titus, as he saw them.

REMBRANDT AND HALS AS PORTRAIT- PAINTERS COMPARED

If Hals and Rembrandt are put side by side as portrait-painters, certain differences can be clearly noted. Hals is like one who can tell a tale quickly and brilliantly. His easy strokes play over the surfaces with ready skill, which can be understood and followed. Rembrandt’s portraits, on the other hand, are built up, “constructed” with solid strength, giving evidence of bone and muscle beneath the surfaces. His is an art that cannot be expressed in a formula and imitated.

Yet when these two artists were engaged to make large group pictures for corporations, the method of Hals gave the greater satisfaction to the patrons. In his groups each solid citizen was unmistakably represented by an excellent portrait, whereas in Rembrandt’s the portrait quality might be made second to the picture composition. This is particularly true of the Sortie of the Banning Cock Company, in Amsterdam, where the figures emerge from such deep shadow that the picture was long called, by mistake, The Night Watch. One whole figure and a few heads furnish “some focal spots of brilliance,” but most of the personages are indistinguishable in the shadowy gloom, which has grown deeper with time. Instead of being ranged in neat rows, the members of the company are shown rushing out of their club-house - coming forward from the dim background. The Banning Cock Company were disappointed, but their picture stands as a record of Rembrandt’s struggle between the impulse to give a detailed representation of outside appearances and the desire to express inner impressions of his own mind.

An early group picture, The Lesson in Anatomy, however, had made Rembrandt famous because of its clear characterization. And The Syndics of the Clothworkers’ Guild, in the Rijks Museum, Amsterdam, painted near the end of his life, brings together at last the two efforts in a most successful result. It is “a work of imagination and yet of real life.”

HAPPINESS AND PROSPERITY FOLLOWED BY DARKER YEARS

For ten years after he painted The Lesson in Anatomy, Rembrandt lived in prosperity and comfort, busy with pupils and at work on the portraits of patrons. At this time he was happy in his home life with his wife, Saskia van Uylenborch, whose portrait he painted many times. Reveling in the beauty of sumptuous materials, he bought freely and lived generously. In these years of vigor and youth Rembrandt dipped his brush into many colors; as he grew older his tone was quieter, his color more restrained.

In 1642 Saskia died, and in the same year his Banning Cock Company picture gave dissatisfaction, injuring his popularity. The rest of his life was darkened by money troubles, although he painted with extraordinary industry and was faithfully helped by his son Titus and by Hendrickje Stoffels, a devoted servant, until she died, in 1656. There is a fine portrait of Hendrickje in Berlin.

As in the case of Michelangelo, Rembrandt’s last years were lonely and sorrowful, though there was in his temperament none of the moroseness and sourness which kept from the great Florentine the joys of friendship. Rembrandt’s failing, rather, was that he had been spendthrift - too generous, too trusting and too sure of the world’s kindliness. But he would have been the last person to think his case over-sad. The thing that mattered most to him was his work, and this he had brought, in evil report and good, to a triumphant end. Born about 1606, he died in the year 1669.

While London, Paris, Dresden, Berlin, Petrograd and other European cities have notable paintings by the Dutch master, the great mass of his work is in Amsterdam and The Hague. In America, New York is especially rich in paintings by Rembrandt, and there are examples of his work in Chicago, Philadelphia and other cities of the United States.

Cups and saucers, dinner plates and all of the other useful and beautiful articles of chinaware which we use in our homes are so familiar to us that we do not realize the knowledge, art and skill that have gone into their making. The art of making them and the materials of which they are made have had a long, romantic history.

Chinaware, or porcelain, pottery, bricks and tiles, drain pipes and flower pots are all made of clay, shaped and then fired or burned, but they are otherwise quite different from one another, both in substance and in the way they are made. Dishes, in which we are particularly interested, are of three general kinds: vitreous, semi-vitreous and earthenware or pottery.

The word “vitreous,” which means “glassy,” is used to identify true porcelain, of which the finest dishes are made. It is extremely hard, because of the high temperature at which it is fired. It is translucent, which means that if you hold a piece of it up to a strong light, the light will show through the thinner parts. Also, if you tap the edge of a porcelain dish with a pencil it will give forth a clear, ringing sound.

Semi-vitreous dishes are much used by restaurants, and for ordinary daily use at home. They are not so hard as vitreous dishes, light will not show through them, and they make a duller sound when you strike them. Both kinds of dishes come in pretty shapes and designs, but you can always tell which kind a dish is by holding it up to the light and by tapping it to see if it rings clearly. Many manufacturers have the word “vitreous,” or “semi-vitreous” printed on the under side of each dish.

Earthenware is coarser than semi-vitreous ware, and much more brittle. It is quite opaque, that is, it will not let the light through, and if you tap it the sound will be dull and flat. Earthenware comes in several different grades. Many attractive pieces are made of it, including vases, jars, bowls, breakfast, tea and dinner sets.

The making of pottery is one of the oldest arts known to man. It is so ancient that no one knows what people first learned to make vessels of clay. In our great museums we may find well shaped bowls and vases which were buried in the graves of the Egyptians perhaps six thousand years ago, and which have helped us to learn something of the state of civilization in Egypt long before the time of Moses. The ancient Cretans and the Greeks made wonderfully beautiful jars and vases thousands of years ago. The As- Syrians and Persians were noted for skill in this work, and Roman pottery has been found everywhere within the limits of that great empire. The Egyptians knew how to make a beautiful glaze for their pottery thousands of years ago. Some students think that they were the first people to learn the art of glazing, and that it was taught by them to the Babylonians and Assyrians. It is believed that the Greeks knew nothing about glazing.

As we have learned, the civilization of Greece and Rome was almost swamped for a time by the rush of barbarian peoples from the north. These peoples knew little about the making of pottery, and the potter’s work that was done in Europe in medieval times was very crude. The knowledge which had been gained during centuries by the Egyptians, the Greeks, the Assyrians and Persians lingered on in Egypt and Syria. After the Moslem conquests the art was revived, and beautiful pottery was made by some of the Moslem peoples.

When the Moors overran Spain they brought with them skilled workers in various crafts, among whom were potters. Knowledge of the art of these Moorish potters soon spread through Europe. Potters of other nations were quick to learn it and improve upon it, and soon potteries sprang up in other countries. Many beautiful things were made, especially in Italy, but they were made from heavy clay.

Long before this time the Chinese, working by themselves, had learned to make fine pottery. In their search for fine clay they found a kind of clay which, when mixed with other ingredients and fired, became what we now know as porcelain or china. The Chinese named this clay kaolin, from the Kao Ling Hills where it was first discovered. The name “porcelain” came from the Italians, who called the Chinese ware porcellana because its satiny surface was like a porcelana, or cowrie shell. It is amusing to know that this shell got its name from the word porcella, “little pig,” because of its shape.

Just when porcelain was first made is not known. Some people believe that it was being made in China before the Christian era, but the earliest known pieces date from about the tenth and eleventh centuries, A.D.

Thus we know that, while Leif Ericson was exploring the coast of North America, and while William the Norman was conquering England, Chinese artist-craftsmen were producing fine porcelain. By the time that Chaucer made his journey to Canterbury with the pilgrims, Chinese potters were supplying the Ming emperors with porcelain that is today worth a king’s ransom.

The Chinese taught the art to the Japanese, and for centuries no other people was able to imitate the ware of these two countries. Traders and travelers brought examples of this porcelain to western Asia and northern Africa, and some of it was brought to Europe from Cairo as early as the twelfth century. European potters tried hard to discover what clay it was that gave the Chinese porcelain its hardness and whiteness, and many experiments were made.

Some of what we now call “soft paste” porcelain is said to have been made in Venice in 1470, by an alchemist, Maestro Antonio, and what is known as the Medici porcelain was made at Florence in the last years of the seventeenth century. This was very beautiful ware, but it lacked some of the qualities that the kaolin gave to the Chinese porcelain. It was not until 1709 that kaolin was discovered to be the long-sought clay. The discoverer was a chemist named Böttger, and he is said to have found it in the clay used to whiten his wig. Böttger lived at Dresden, but he moved to Meissen, where he made the famous Dresden china. He tried to keep his discovery secret, but in vain. In a few years porcelain was made in other countries of Europe, and French, Italian and Austrian porcelain also became famous. It received its common name of china because it was first made in that country.

While clay has always been the chief ingredient of porcelain, other materials are used with it. Among these are feldspar, ground quartz, calcium carbonate in the form of chalk, and sometimes calcium phosphate in the form of bone ash. The kaolin, or china clay, does not melt and become transparent, but some of the other things, such as the feldspar, do. If you were to look at a piece of porcelain through a microscope, you would see a glassy substance packed full of opaque sticks of kaolin. When the light rays try to find their way through the glassy part of porcelain, they are reflected back and forth among these sticks, and it is this that gives fine porcelain its soft translucence.

Early in the eighteenth century lovely china began to be made at Sevres, Chantilly and Vincennes in France, and at Stratfordle-Bow, Chelsea and Derby in England and in many other places in these and other countries. Each manufacturer developed his own formula for making the paste. There were three general types of porcelain made, “hard paste,” “soft paste” and “bone paste.” Soft paste porcelain is very lovely, but is slightly porous. Most modern china is made of some variety of hard paste or bone paste. It was the development of bone paste that first brought about quantity production of fine china. The English potters, sometime about the middle of the eighteenth century, found that a fine, hard china could be made at a low cost by adding bone ash to the mixture.

China and earthenware were brought to America in the colonial period and in the early years of the Republic by ship-loads. Most of this ware was English, and so important was the American market that some of the potteries made a specialty of china and fine earthenware with American patriotic and scenic designs. These are now eagerly sought by collectors. A factory for making bone china was started in Philadelphia in 1769 by two men, George Anthony Morris and Gousse Bonnin. Bonnin is believed to have learned his trade at Bow. The business was closed three years later for lack of money to carry it on, though these unfortunate pioneers had tried in many ways to raise the necessary funds. In 1771 they had appealed to the Pennsylvania Assembly for a loan, and later they had set up a lottery, but they could not get enough money to carry on. Another Philadelphia pioneer in the making of china was more successful. William Ellis Tucker, a Quaker, opened a factory in 1825 for the manufacture of hard paste chinaware. This business flourished for more than twenty years. To-day much fine china is made in the United States, besides semi-vitreous ware and clay products of every imaginable kind.

Many things happen to the clay after it has been taken out of the ground, before it is ready to make a dainty cup and saucer, a graceful vase, or any of the numerous other things that are made of china. To take out any sand that may be in the clay after it is quarried, it is mixed with water and strained through a fine sieve into a tank, where it is allowed to settle, and the water is drawn off. The clay is then put into filters, the water is pressed out, and the clay is ready to be shipped to the pottery. It is not yet ready for the potter, however, and the processes through which it has to go depend upon how it is to be used.

To make fine china, the kaolin is mixed with other materials and water is added. After it is thoroughly mixed it is freed of any remaining impurities by straining and by means of electric magnets to remove particles of iron. When it has been mixed to a thick, creamy paste that can be molded into any shape, it may either be used at once, or it may be filtered and pressed again, and folded away in a dark place for later use. Some potters put it through still another mill to press out any air that may be in it.

Valuable vases, and many other things, are still made on the potter’s, or throwing, wheel. This is a contrivance which was probably used in Egypt six thousand years ago and has been very little altered in principle since. The potters of Babylon and Nineveh used wheels very much like it, even before the Bible was written. The throwing-wheel is a disk which revolves horizontally in a pan. The pace at which it moves is fixed by a brake which the potter controls. The wheel is still sometimes worked by the potter’s foot, but most of the wheels used in large potteries are worked by electricity.

As the throwing-wheel spins round on its axle, the potter throws the clay, which sticks to the wheel and goes round with it. Then the art of the potter comes into play. As the wheel spins he presses, and pulls, and molds it with his skillful hands or with tools made for the purpose. He works from the base upward, shaping the walls, making them the right height and thickness, and gradually the clay takes on the desired shape. When it is finished, the vessel is set aside to dry, so that it can be fixed on a lathe, and turned and smoothed. Plates, bowls, cups and other round pieces are made on a wheel that is shaped to mold the face of the article, while a steel tool is held so as to shape the back of the article. This process is often called “jiggering.”

Many articles, such as teapots, handles and oddly shaped pieces, cannot be made on the wheel, but are “cast’ in a plaster of Paris mold. A thin, cream-like mixture of clay called “slip” is poured into the mold and allowed to stand. The water in the slip is absorbed by the plaster of Paris, leaving the clay on the inside of the mold. The longer it stands, the thicker the clay will be. When it has reached the desired thickness, the remaining water is poured off and the cast is allowed to dry. Then it is taken from the mold, trimmed and smoothed. Cup- handles, spouts for teapots and other things of the sort are made in separate molds and stuck on with a little of the slip. There is a third method called “pressing,” in which the clay is placed on a one-piece mold and hammered into shape with a hand batter. All of these methods require skill and experience, and though machinery is used as an aid to the potters, eighty percent of the work in a pottery is hand work.

After the clay has been shaped, the vessels are put in a drying room, and then comes the delicate and difficult process of baking, or firing, the clay to make it into porcelain. For this purpose the china is packed into closed earthenware boxes called saggers, in such a way that they will not touch one another. The saggers are packed into a kiln (pronounced kill), which is a kind of furnace, and heated until the temperature has reached as high as 1,500 degrees Centigrade. The kiln is kept at this temperature for about ten hours, and is then allowed to cool so gradually that it is three or four days from the time they are put in before the saggers are opened and the “biscuit,” as it is now called, is taken out.

The dishes are now ready for glazing. The pieces are dipped in a kind of liquid glass called “glaze slip,” which leaves a thin, even coating all over the biscuit. Then they are put into another kiln and fired at a temperature hot enough to fuse the glaze and the biscuit and give the china a softly shining surface.

Some china is decorated before the glaze is put on, and this we call “underglaze” decoration. There are various ways of applying it to the biscuit. One method is to make the design in one color, by means of copper-plate printing. “Overglaze” decoration is more elaborate, and may be painted by hand or by decalcomania. In this latter process, the design is lithographed on a special paper which is pressed on the china in such a way that the whole design is transferred to it. If gold is used, it is usually applied to the smooth surface of the glaze, just as the colors are. Etched, or encrusted, gold decorations are made by cutting the design in the glaze with acid, and then covering it with gold. When the gold has been burnished the high parts of the design are bright against the duller sheen of the low parts, giving a very rich effect. After the colors and gold have been applied, they are set, or fused with the china by another firing. Quite lovely raised designs are sometimes made by pressing or building them on the clay before it is fired.