Page:How to show pictures to children (IA howtoshowpictur00hurl).pdf/122

 haps, being the Appeal to the Great Spirit. Others are the Signal of Peace; the Protest; the Medicine Man; an Indian Hunter.

Certain local historical subjects are being used by contemporary mural painters with good effect in the decoration of American public buildings. Such, for instance, is F. D. Millet's Treaty with the Indians, in the Capitol at St. Paul, Minnesota, and such the Edict of Lord Baltimore, by E. H. Blashfield, in the Baltimore Court-House.

It is in view of so many lesson uses of pictures that our schools have multiplied the prints on the walls in the last years, greatly beautifying the rooms. Educators and dealers have prepared carefully graded lists of subjects corresponding to the school grades. These are helpful and suggestive, but by no means final. No two schools, and no two homes, should be decorated alike. Mechanical monotony is to be avoided. There is danger, too, of letting the utilitarian view of art take precedence of the prime value of pictures as pure decoration and pure joy. The educator must be careful not to let the instructive element outweigh the æsthetic.

The wall pictures are only a part of the school picture equipment. The enterprising teacher makes portfolio collections on her own account, and encourages the pupils to collect prints in such ways as I have indicated. The stereopticon, the reflectoscope, or the radiopticon are also in wide use in school lec-