his originals, calling them his life insurance, and expecting them to take the place of that protection.

THE NEWSPAPER ARTISTS

The established illustrator of to-day has other advantages over the artist of twenty-five years ago-he may live most anywhere he pleases or travel anywhere his fancy takes him. Provided he carries his work along, he may be in Paris or Munich; out on Western plains or up in Eastern mountains. In fact, there is no other profession or calling that pays its successful men so well and that at the same time gives them half the freedom. Of course there are exceptions to this rule; there are those men who, through choice of subjects or peculiar line of work, are compelled to spend most of their time in the city. But usually they find their greatest interest in living hard by the spot that produces the material they need. And be sure these men are rewarded, and that right substantially. Take those on the newspapers, for example: John T. McCutcheon, that happy cartoonist of the Chicago Tribune, receives $20,000 per year, or about $55 per laugh and that is not taking into account. vacation days, when pay goes on just the same for the laugh he might have produced. It is McCutcheon's ability to draw the sunny side, to make his assaults upon corruption in high places carry a smile with them, that gives the extreme of value to his work. In contrast, however, is Bradley, of the Chicago News, who has encompassed a goodly fortune by his ability to picture life as stern reality and vice as anything rather than enticing.

THE FUNNY MEN

Newspaper cartoonists and caricaturists are not the only ones on the art staff of the daily press that are well paid. Dan Smith, the crack newspaper illustrator, receives $65 a day from the New York World. For fear that he might acquire more than his share of this world's goods (no pun intended), Mr. Smith works but four days a week on the newspaper and manages very com

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fortably on his yearly income of $13,520. When it comes to the "funny" men of the daily press, the men who draw Buster Browns and Tiny Tads, Panhandle Petes and Newlyweds' Babies, most any of them receive salaries equal to the income of the average successful business man. In fact, Outcault, the originator of Buster Brown, has been accused of having made $100,000 a year for several years out of the popularity of that much-drawn young man. Windsor McKay broke all records when he was keeping three series of comics going and starring on the vaudeville stage as well. His strength, ability and ambition seem without limit. even ten years ago, would ever have thought an artist capable of turning out such weird, imaginative work as Little Nemo, Sammy Sneeze and The Dream of a Rarebit Fiend, week in and week out, and at the same time do a turn, with the support of his creative pen, to the delight of New York's "continuous" audiences? Mr. McKay, rather than resembling the impracticable and idle dreamer the artist is often charged with being, more nearly resembles one of our captains of industry, whose tireless devotion to his undertakings has made him a marvel even in our day of never-ending toil.

E. A. ABBEY

Art now has so many and such diversified avenues of expression, and so many of its followers are considered, oftentimes against their will, specialists in some one of its branches, that little attempt is being made here to introduce them in the order of their merit; certainly not in the order of their earning capacity. As is the case with all of the fine arts, the men doing the most serious and lasting work find the way most difficult. It is quite certain that our best illustrators have been longest in arriving; yet the man who, through some original method of treatment or cleverness of ideas, has been able to jump to the front, deserves credit as well as compensation. His work may be a long way from even the more reasonable requirements of art, but he generally knows this and admits that he entertains or pleases without in

structing. The best of these men usually find their weakness later on, and many of them have sacrificed the greater portion of a princely income that they might bring themselves into repute with their fellows and produce something lasting. Yet there are those who have risen rapidly without compromising their standards. E. A. Abbey may well be considered the most striking example of an artist who early found the smile of Fortune directed on him, while he was working, without deviation, toward his highest ideals.

When but nineteen years old he was taken on Harper's, and after seven years of service for them in this country the publishing house sent him to England. While no certain record is available as to his earnings during those first years, there can be no question but that they were sufficient for all reasonable demands. It was not so very long after his establishment in England that he was able to secure almost any price he cared to ask for his illustrations, Harper's paying him $1,500 for page drawings. Abbey does little, if any, work for reproduction these days, as his time is occupied with larger tasks. If fame had not been his at the time, it would have come with the painting of King Edward's coronation, by royal command.

THE "POPULAR" SCHOOL

Of the men whose incomes have increased by leaps and bounds, until there is scarcely a way to reckon them, there may be a half dozen. The financial advancement of these popular artists may reasonably, if reason could be attached to anything so sensational, be compared with the meteoric rises of the young men who have stepped into Wall Street and stepped out again with a fortune. The only real difference is that the gambler usually loses what he wins in a shorter time than it took him to acquire it, while the popular artist is generally sure of acquiring for several years at least.

CHRISTY, FISHER AND HUTT Howard Chandler Christy is said to have "cleaned up" $80,000 in one year;

which sum is something more than the combined salaries of all the members of President Roosevelt's Cabinet. This may be an exaggeration—it probably is, and it should be. Yet that it is possible for Christy to make such a sum and that it is probable his income for a twelvemonth has climbed well up toward that figure, is proven by the fact that his royalties on an edition of one portfolio of drawings, the execution of which probably occupied less than a month, was $13,000 the first year it was out. The advertising value of Christy's name is so great that he has been offered handsome studio-apartments rent free if he would only move into them and establish the reputation of the building. Harrison Fisher is another popular artist who has found the public very practically appreciative. His career in many respects has been similar to that of Christy's, also his income; though it is doubtful if the latter has ever reached the high-water mark set by Christy's star year. Record has it that Fisher's brush brought him $20,000 in seven months at one time. Henry Hutt is also a member of this class. In ten years he sprinted from a four-dollar-a-week artist's "devil" in a Chicago engraving house all the way to a seat of honour in the real artists' club. While the first years of Mr. Hutt's "career" were somewhat stormy, at least they were proportionately short. He early found himself and fixed a rising scale of prices on his work. This proved an excellent plan, the only change necessary in the programme being a readjustment of the scale in order to frighten off the buyer with a limited purse. The real, financial success of these three men, Christy, Fisher and Hutt, lies in their ability to produce. Except when selling stuff on a royalty basis, the prices paid them, while seemingly enormous, are actually not record-breaking.

THE LEYENDECKERS

The Leyendeckers, while working along different lines from those followed by the three prolific ones just mentioned, and with vastly different ideals, are yet to be classed among the popular artists. Like Hutt, both of these men heard the call of the Muse above the confusion of

a Chicago engraving house-the same engraving house, in fact. Instead of running to girls' heads, the Leyendeckers have won great sums from drawing men. The writer some two years ago had the pleasure of calling at Mr. J. C. Leyendecker's studio with a request for a magazine cover design; no suggestion was advanced as to subject and no limit set as to price; but in reply to this offer Mr. Leyendecker could only say that his time was booked for a year ahead, and that it was out of the question for him to consider a commission to be executed within that time. As to the prices these men receive, Collier's pays F. X. Leyendecker $500 for each drawing he makes for them; while his brother contents himself with $350 per drawing from that

source.

FIGURES AND INCOMES

There are many other illustrators who have received substantial reward for their work, as well as achieving an enviable reputation from the production of pictures that will last. Arthur I. Keller probably has more de luxe editions of our best American classics to his credit than any other illustrator; and to show the prominent position the illustrator occupies in these volumes it is only necessary to mention that they are known as the Keller Edition. Louis Loeb, before he abandoned illustrating that he might have the more time to paint, was paid $500 a picture on the work he did for Collier's. F. C. Yohn is just now adding to his income as well as reputation in making the round-the-world trip with the fleet. This is supplying him with material for years to come as well as for the delightfully sketchy work now appearing. Peter Newell, the creator of a number of children's books that interest the grownups, is another author-illustrator-cartoonist who has climbed high. Will Bradley made art pay long before he accepted Collier's offer of $1,000 a month as their art editor. J. M. Flagg received $3,500 for the drawings he made during the month of last October. The Associated Sunday Magazine recently paid him. $1,500 for twelve days' work. And that means literally twelve days, for during

the twelve evenings he knocked out comics at the rate of $30 per evening. Hy. Meyer, with his comics, children's books, theatrical posters and page each Sunday in the Times, is not falling much short of $10,000 a year. When Harry Ogden was working under contract for Wanamaker's and the Strobridge Lithographing Company, he received $5,000 a year from each of them and was able to turn out about another $5,000 worth of work from miscellaneous commissions. J. V. McFall has received $2,000 from one publication (The Associated Sunday Magazine) for illustrations made since the beginning of 1908. Several years ago he refused a salary offer of $8,000 a year.

There are fully a score of younger men who are doing serious work and who promise much for the illustrations of the future. W. J. Aylward, N. C. Wyeth, Arthur Becker, Schoonover, Kemp, Townsend, Covey are among these, and they are the men who are occupying the high places in our best publications today. Their incomes will range from $2,000 to $10,000 a year.

THE WOMEN ILLUSTRATORS Illustration has proven a remunerative calling for women as well as for men; and in their competition the women have two, at least, advantages-their industry and their facility. The women artists are, as a rule, very diligent and work with great rapidity. Their rapidity, however, often tempts them to slight a drawing, provided the general effect is satisfactory. This combination of conditions has brought them good incomes-but not fabulous. Sarah S. Stillwell Weber ranks high among the women illustrators-probably because she lacks the characteristics just applied to her sister artists. Mrs. Weber works few hours a day and without haste; but there are several publishers always waiting and willing to pay $150 or more. for any cover she cares to draw. Elizabeth Shippen Greene, Jessie Wilcox Smith and Violet Oakley own a goodly mansion of colonial design, built of the cheques received from their publishers. Rose O'Neill Wilson selected one of the

cool days last month to make $200. From morning till night-and she had commenced and completed a drawing that brought her that sum. Of the other women artists, May Wilson Preston, Alice Barber Stephens, Charlotte Weber Ditzler and Grace Wiederseim each average more than $5,000 a year from their drawings.

THE FOREIGN GROUP

The English illustrators, like the French and German, are not paid so well as the American, though many of them have found something close to riches come their way when they have turned to painting. Frank Brangwyn and Frank Craig are able to secure the top prices from American publishers, and while their work found ready sale at the best terms offered in England, yet they have both turned to the galleries for the greater reward for their efforts. Few think of Whistler as an illustrator and fewer still know that there was a time when he attempted to illustrate so commercial a thing as the report of a United States Coast Survey Commission. The reason why more has not been heard of this is on acount of the etchings being refused because the Commission did not approve of Whistler's way of drawing trees. These etchings were recently sold and brought fabulous prices. When J. J. Shannon visited this country not long ago he found many willing sitters. The portraits of the late Bishop Potter and Mrs. Potter were done at that time. Mr. Shannon spent four months in this country and carried back eighty thousand American dollars to show for his efforts, to be changed into English pounds. Mr. Shannon usually receives $10,000 for a portrait commission.

Mèrvon, the great French etcher, failed both of reward and appreciation during his life. He died in an insane asylum, mad from disappointment and actual want. His etchings, a few copies of

which are carefully guarded in the Astor Library, are now beyond price. John W. Alexander, in many respects our greatest painter, began his art career making wood cuts for Harper's. Mr. Alexander now commands the highest price for his work, his wonderful murals in the Congressional Library at Washington and Carnegie Institute, Pittsburg, giving proof of its worth. Abbey, as a painter, received $200,000 for his work in the Boston Public Library, and spent $50,000 for accessories. John Singer Sargent made £60,000 in one year painting portraits of the mighty ones of England; £1,000 would be the price for a most unimportant commission. The Ethel Barrymore cover that Sargent painted for The Ladies' Home Journal occupied one day of his time and netted him $1,000.

The painters of other days give some interesting, as well as sad, examples of what artists are paid-and are not paid. Corot, for one of his wonderful landscapes, considered himself fortunate in receiving 650 francs. This picture was auctioned off last June, at the Hotel Drouot, a great Paris auction house, for 101,000 francs. The purchaser is a dealer, who expects to profit by another sale. Velasquez was paid about $400, or its equivalent, a vear as Court Painter and Master of Ceremonies under Philip IV. of Spain. Yet Titian, living at an earlier period, built a palace from the proceeds from his pictures. Rembrandt, who first made himself rich and famous, also building a palace, that he furnished with all the luxury of the East, afterward lost everything and died in poverty.

Whistler, as might be expected, furnishes a fitting climax and conclusion to this recital of the artist's chance to gain riches. His portrait of Carlyle, painted in three or four days, brought $4,000the income for a year of many a man who is considered to be "doing well" in the business world.

Amos Stote.

T would be a great benefit to women if they could be induced to regard amusement in the simple way that men do, and give up the idea that, unless combined in some way with self-improvement, it needs an apology. A man is never ashamed of desiring entertainment pure and simple, and, having decided upon a form of amusement, pursues it with entire singlemindedness and an unblushing disregard of its frivolous character. If such plays as The Sunken Bell, Hedda Gabler or Peer Gynt do not amuse him he does not go to see them. The fact that they are triumphs of dramatic construction, full of literary merit, or "classics" in their own land does not move him; nor does he consider any apology necessary for his firm refusal to attend plays given in strange tongues. The average woman, on the contrary, can never entirely rid herself of the idea that amusement by itself is an unworthy object, and that to be made presentable it should be combined with something educational.

It is to this feeling that we owe those dreary entertainments that are given from time to time, sometimes score a brief success, and then disappear, amid complaints on the part of the originators that nothing really intellectual has any chance in this country. The performers in these entertainments are often women, they are generally managed by women, are invariably attended by women, and are remarkable for the very slight demands which they make upon the brains of the audience as contrasted with the heavy drafts upon their credulity.

Perhaps the commonest form of improving entertainment is the drawingroom "talk," a sort of degenerate lecture. Fifty years ago, before books were as cheap and as plenty as they are now, the lecturer was a real force in our civilisation. Then some man of known ability, master of his subject, would impart his

knowledge to an audience eager to receive it. Now a band of idle women, too indolent to read for themselves, assemble to hear what some other woman, poorly equipped for the task, has to say about art, the works of some obscure writer, or, theme upon which her ignorance is generally the most colossal, the drama. Were the women who attend these "talks" a little more sincere they would confess that they were bored by them; were they a little more intelligent they would realise that they were certainly not being instructed.

It is interesting to notice the development of these "talks" from their humble beginnings of thirty years ago, when the course began with "The Lake Poets," was followed by "Shelley, Keats and Tennyson," lumped together for convenience' sake, and ended with a comprehensive view of "Lowell, Whittier and Longfellow." The subjects of these lectures were taken in chronological order (no other system was dreamed of), which led to strange and unhallowed. unions between such writers as Emerson and Poe, Lowell and Whitman, or Dickens and De Quincey. The talks on art generally began with "Greek Sculpture," with photographs handed about among the audience, and seldom went further than "Great Painters of the Sixteenth Century."

From these simple beginnings have sprung the discourses upon every imaginable subject to which we are invited to listen in the course of a winter. One woman advertises a series on "The Great Religions of the World," in which Mrs. Eddy and Mme. Blavatsky are treated with the same seriousness as Buddha and Mahomet; another offers a "Complete Synopsis of Herbert Spencer's Philosophy" in six lectures, while a third reaps a rich harvest by means of a course on "Browning's Religious Belief as Manifested in His Poetry." These last lectures are particularly successful, as most of the women who attend them have long