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May 25, 1883.] THE PHOTOGRAPHIC NEWS. 329 Mrs, Carlyle’s letters abound in interesting preferences to photography. “ Blessed be the inventor of photo graphy,” she says, writing in 1859, the time of the glass 11 positive.” “ I set him above even the inventor of chloroform! It has given more positive pleasure to poor suffering humanity than anything that has 1 cast up ’ in my time, or is like to —this art, by which even the ‘ poor ’ can possess themselves of tolerable likenesses of their absent dear ones.” Six years later, she says of a photograph of a middle-aged lady : " Photography is apt to be cruel to women out of their teens,” a criticism which is perfectly true when the lady happens to be, as she was, in this case, past middle age, and unmarried. Amusing and shrewd are her remarks concerning the exhibition in shop- windows of her own photograph. “ But the greatest testimony to your fame seems to me to be the fact of my photograph—the whole three, two of them very ugly— stuck up in Macmichael’s window. Did you ever hear anything so preposterous in you life ? And what imperti nence on the part of ! He must have sent my three along with your nine to the wholesale man in Soho Square without leave asked. But it proves the interest or curiosity you excite ; for being neither a ‘ distinguished authoress,’ nor a ‘celebrated murderess,’ nor an actress, nor a ‘ Skittles ’ (the four classes of women promoted to the shop-windows), it can only be as Mrs. Carlyle that they offer me for sale.” tions of M. Dagron and his officials, who managed the ria 1 post, than to the infallibility of the pigeons. If we turn to M. Dagron’s own account—for it is to him that the pro duction of the micro-photographic films was due—we find that “ with the exception of a few of the pellicles, which were not repeated more than six times, from the fact that they arrived and were acknowledged by balloon promptly, the greater number of the dispatches were multiplied as many as twenty times, and some even were repeated thirty-five and thirty-eight times.” So that in order to get the 50,000 messages into Paris, as a rule, twenty photographic copies of it were sent off by pigeon, from which it may be inferred that, generally speaking, only one messenger in a score flew to its destina tion. We are far from wishing to underrate the mar vellous results of la poste cerienne, but it was only by energetically sending off film after film in this way that success was secured; and, indeed, the fifty thousand messages delivered scarcely represent half those sent off, since the total of these was 115,000. Still, so well was the photography done, and so light were the films, that, not withstanding the fact that every message was readable when projected from a lantern, M. Dagron tells us that the total number of messages upon film, made during the investment of Paris, “ only weighed in all two grammes, and one pigeon could have easily carried the lot in a quill tube attached to its tail.” Professor Holden, in his “ Monograph on the Central Parts of the Nebula of Orion,” just published as an appendix to the “ Washington Observations ” for 1878, makes a suggestive observation relative to the respective value of photographs and drawings of astral phenomena. While admitting it is too soon to give a final discussion of the photographic results attained by Dr. Draper, he points out that, on comparing Dr. Draper’s photograph of the nebula with Bond’s drawing—which is the most accurate representation of a single celestial object which has been made by the old methods—the photograph will be found for nearly every purpose incomparably better than the drawing. Yet the photograph was made in 137 minutes, while the labour of observing for the drawing extended over years. In the Illustrated London News we find sketches taken at the opening of the Fisheries Exhibition. Among them we find a drawing of a camera of novel design, manned by two photographers. One is busily engaged under the focussing screen, while the other appears to be timing the exposure by his watch. Every artist would do well to learn a little about photography. The statement recently made by a contemporary that homing pigeons may be trained to fly with absolute cer tainty, seeing that they carried into Faris no less than fifty thousand photographic despatches during the siege, requires some little qualification. It is no doubt true that the number of messages delivered by the winged messengers amounted to this large number; but the wonderful result was due rather to the indefatigable exer- It is sad when your photograph does not represent you as what you imagine you are or ought to be. His Majesty of Bavaria is in this predicament just now. He is getting very stout, and his recent photographs have revealed to him the painful fact. So much has he taken his increasing rotundity to heart, that all his last taken photographs have been extensively retouched to conceal his tendency to corpulency. King Louis is nothing if not eccentric, and if he goes on increasing in size we should not be surprised at hearing he had adopted the device of the New Englander who wanted to create a favourable impression by means of his photo graph. Going with a lady into the studio of a Vermont photographer, he explained that he had just been “ hitched,” and that he wanted a picture of himself and wife to send to the latter’s friends, who were rather “ high- toned” people in the States. Just as the arrangements were completed preparatory to exposing the plate, the gentleman took the photographer aside, and asked him to " stand in” with the biide instead of himself. His wife’s friends had never seen him, and he felt pretty sure that if he sent down his own portrait they would take him for a petty larceny thief, and be “ dead agin ” him. The photo grapher, on the contrary, had the appearance of a solid capitalist, and was endowed with a pair of whiskers which would be sure to catch them, and create harmony in the family circle. It is to be regretted that at this point the original chronicler of our story stops short, as chroniclers of good stories generally do when you want to know what comes next.