By
PAUL L. ANDERSON
A Voice From Far Cathay
Dear Mentor:—One of my most respected college professors advised his classes to review their several groups of studies every seven years, and in the broad, I agree with the advice. It is just this review that The Mentor gives some of us. The Mentor is not learned. It furnishes a most readable review, with pithy editorials and discriminatively selected pictures. It can be appreciated by the man who has never been outside the town of his birth, and it can be enjoyed by the person who has converted stamped gold into the legal tender which lets one into the city, or gallery, or park, or museum, or observatory described; and it can be read with profit by the one who is interpreting life in the class room.
I usually read it by bits between courses at the dinner table, and it often has taken the place of another seat. It has this advantage: it never talks shop, save in an entertaining way.
The pictures make good material for “identification” or “information tests.” A selection of twenty makes good material for one “stunt” of an evening for a small group of guests.
But I like them best for use in a bulletin board in my class room. With titles or brief notes translated into Chinese, they attract the students around the board between classes. It is an easy matter to have a series of fifteen or twenty groups through the year, that are of interest to one’s students, and give real information and stimulus.
This letter is not designed to lead you to believe that the publication takes its place with the essential possessions of the American missionary in the Orient—the Bible, Montgomery Ward catalog, and tennis racquet—but it is written that you may know that it helps one to keep “fit.”
In appreciation, yours,
Daniel S. Dye
West China Union University
Chengtu, West China
BY PAUL L. ANDERSON
PHOTOGRAPH FROM A DAGUERREOTYPE
ONE
The daguerreotype was at one time very popular for portraiture, but the process has certain drawbacks that have caused it to be superseded by improved methods. Among these drawbacks are the following: The exposures required are rather long; it is impossible to make duplicates—a separate exposure must be made for each picture; the picture must be held at a certain angle to make it visible, and the process is rather expensive and laborious to work. Nevertheless, exquisite effects may be obtained in daguerreotype; the writer has seen pictures of this kind which for sheer beauty yield to none of the modern printing mediums.
The decadence of the daguerreotype is to be regretted for at least one reason,—the man who elected to work in that medium was necessarily at least a craftsman, whereas at the present time many photographers are neither artists nor craftsmen, but merely mechanics of only fair skill. Photography has been brought to such a state of perfection that good technical results may be obtained by persons that work by rote and know absolutely nothing of the principles underlying the craft. This lack of training and enthusiasm for the work must evidently be reflected in the results obtained.
There are few forms of portraiture art that equal in beauty choice early examples of daguerreotype photography. They have the exquisite delicacy, softness and individual charm of the best miniature portraits. Good old daguerreotypes are treasured possessions in the homes of many families—and rightly so, for they combine a fine quality of art with a gentle personal appeal.
WRITTEN FOR THE MENTOR BY PAUL L. ANDERSON
ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR. VOL. 6, No. 12, SERIAL No. 160
COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION, INC.
FROM A PRINT BY ALVIN LANGDON COBURN
SELF-PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPH—By D. O. Hill
TWO