share of the honourable encouragement which is its due, or else
honestly to resign all claim to national merit, in these branches
of civilization; leaving the honour to the individual. As neither
the government, nor men singly, can do much toward encouraging
the arts, this would seem to be the very field in which societies
might hope to produce great results. Would it not be a good
innovation, if those who often unite to present some public
testimonial of respect to an individual, should select, instead
of the piece of plate, usual on such occasions, a picture or work
of sculpture? Either, it is to be supposed, if respectable in its
way, would be a more agreeable offering, to a person of
education, than gold or silver in the shape most modern workmen
give them. Under such circumstances, who would not prefer a
picture by Cole or Wier {sic}, a statue like Greenough's Medora,
Power's Eve, or Crawford's Orpheus, to all the silver salvers in
New York? Who would not prefer even a copy from some fine bust or
head of antiquity, from some celebrated cabinet picture, to the
best medal that has yet been struck in this country?

{"Cole" = Thomas Cole (1801-1848), American painter and founder
of the so-called Hudson River School of landscape painting;
"Wier" = Robert Weir (1803-1889), another American landscape
painter; "Greenough" = Horatio Greenough (1805-1852), American
sculptor, and a close friend of Susan Fenimore Cooper's father;
"Power" = Hiram Powers (1805-1873), another famous American
sculptor; "Crawford" = Thomas Crawford (1813-1857), another
American sculptor, whose statue of Orpheus was purchased by the
Boston Athenaeum; "cabinet picture" = picture exhibited in a
gallery or museum}