June 4th.--At our visit to Powers's studio on Tuesday, we saw a marble
copy of the fisher-boy holding a shell to his ear, and the bust of
Proserpine, and two or three other ideal busts; various casts of most of
the ideal statues and portrait busts which he has executed. He talks
very freely about his works, and is no exception to the rule that an
artist is not apt to speak in a very laudatory style of a brother artist.
He showed us a bust of Mr. Sparks by Persico,--a lifeless and thoughtless
thing enough, to be sure,--and compared it with a very good one of the
same gentleman by himself; but his chiefest scorn was bestowed on a
wretched and ridiculous image of Mr. King, of Alabama, by Clark Mills, of
which he said he had been employed to make several copies for Southern
gentlemen. The consciousness of power is plainly to be seen, and the
assertion of it by no means withheld, in his simple and natural
character; nor does it give me an idea of vanity on his part to see and
hear it. He appears to consider himself neglected by his country,--by
the government of it, at least,--and talks with indignation of the byways
and political intrigue which, he thinks, win the rewards that ought to be
bestowed exclusively on merit.
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