decorative that to see one of his pictures in a frame seems almost
pathetic, when we think how infinitely more beautiful it would look as
part of a wall. Eugène Carrière is very well represented by a stately
portrait of a lady with a small dog. Carrière's mellow richness is
entirely his own and rarely met with in any other artist's work.

On the west wall opposite the Puvis four very different canvases deserve
to be mentioned. In the center a young Russian, Nicholas Fechin,
displays a very unusual virtuosity in a picture of a somewhat
sensual-looking young creature. Aside from the fascination of this young
human animal, the handling of paint in this canvas is most
extraordinary, possessing a technical quality few other canvases in the
entire exhibition have. There is life, such as very few painters ever
attain, and seen only in the work of a master. This work is not entirely
a Nell Brinkley in oil, either. I confess I have a strange fondness for
this weird canvas.

The international character of this gallery is most pronounced. Directly
above the Fechin, Frits Thaulow, the Norwegian, justifies his reputation
as the painter of flowing water in a picture of great beauty. Gaston La
Touche faintly discloses in a large canvas his imaginative style,
carried so much farther in his later work. Joseph Bail, the Frenchman,
got into this gallery probably only on the basis of size, to balance the
La Touche on the other side. To all appearances Bail has very little in
common with the general modern character of this gallery. Nevertheless
his canvas has merit in many ways.



Foreign Nations