. Our Philadelphia. d is pro-ducing and by the incentive this knowledge is to competi-tion, and as the Centennial was the first held in Americait probably accomplished more for the country than thosethat followed. But I do not have to be an authority onmanufacture and commerce to see that they flourishedbefore the Centennial; I have learned enough about artsince to know that its existence was not first revealedto Philadelphia by the Centennial. The Exhibition hadan influence on art which I am far from undervaluing. Itsgalleries of paintings and prints, drawings and sculptures,were an aid in in
. Our Philadelphia. d is pro-ducing and by the incentive this knowledge is to competi-tion, and as the Centennial was the first held in Americait probably accomplished more for the country than thosethat followed. But I do not have to be an authority onmanufacture and commerce to see that they flourishedbefore the Centennial; I have learned enough about artsince to know that its existence was not first revealedto Philadelphia by the Centennial. The Exhibition hadan influence on art which I am far from undervaluing. Itsgalleries of paintings and prints, drawings and sculptures,were an aid in innumerable ways to artists and studentswho previously had had no facilities for seeing a repre-sentative collection. It threw light on the arts of designfor the manufacturer. But we knew a thing or two aboutbeauty down in Philadelphia before 1876, though beautywas a subject to which we had ceased to pay much atten-tion, and from the Centennial we borrowed too manytastes and standards that did not belong to us. It set. THE BRIDGE ACROSS MARKET STREET FROM BROAD STREET STATION THE FIRST AWAKENING 231 Philadelphia talking an appalling lot of rubbish about art,and the new affectation of interest was more deplorablethan the old frank indifference. I was as ignorant of art as the child unborn, but notmore ignorant than the average Philadelphian. The oldobligatory visits to the Academy had made but a fleetingimpression and I never repeated them when the obligationrested solely with me. I had never met an artist, neverbeen in a studio. The result was that the Art Galleriesat the Centennial left me as blank and bewildered as theHall of Machinery. Of all the paintings, the one I re-membered was Luke Fildess picture of a milkmaid whichI could not forget because, in a glaring, plush-framedchromo-lithograph, it reappeared promptly in Philadel-phia dining- and bedrooms, the most popular picture ofthe Centennial—a popularity in which I can discern nosigns of grace. Nor can I discern them in
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