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LIVING AMERICAN ARTISTS.     407

a season of hard work and of but limited in-come; but the time was nearing, fruitful of reward for all this patient toil and noble effort. Ward was elected an Academician in 1863. He now felt that it was due to himself to make a struggle to set up his Indian life size, but he saw the necessity of special study for the work before commencing it in earnest. So, as soon as possible, and even then at no little sacrifice of his means, he left for the Northwest, where he spent several months among the Red men, studying their habits and making wax models of them, which have since been pronounced marvels in truthful delineation of form and character.

It was not until 1864, therefore, that "The Indian Hunter" was finished in the clay. The artist felt that on its reception, favorable or otherwise, his immediate future in a great measure must depend; so he spared neither thought nor labor to realize his ideal.

It was exhibited in plaster at the gallery of John Snedicor, on Broadway, where, as all interested in the growth of art and acquainted with its later history know, it received an enthusiastic reception from art lovers generally, and won unqualified admiration from the critics. It was exhibited here but a few days when the proposition was made by several of our wealthy citizens to purchase it for the Central Park.

In the mean time Ward, thus warmly encouraged, proceeded to have the statue put in bronze, at his own expense. The work was finished before the opening of the Paris Exposition in 1867, and the sculptor, who in the mean time had agreed to the terms of purchase, was permitted to send the statue to Europe for exhibition. Its exposition there did our country honor, and confirmed the artist's reputation and his right to rank among the first of living sculptors.

And now it was no longer the struggle for bread or reputation; both in the future were well assured. Orders came in beyond the artist's ability to execute. The Academy had already conferred the fullness of its honors.

Whilst the Indian, in plaster, was still on exhibition in the Broadway gallery, Mr. Belmont, the banker, gave Ward a commission for the heroic statue of Commodore Perry, since executed in bronze, and erected at Newport on a temporary pedestal: the elaborate work on that intended to support it being even yet unfinished. Of this pedestal, however, we shall speak hereafter.

About the same time he received this important commission he received one also for his "Good Samaritan," designed to commemorate the discovery of ether as an anæsthetic, since erected on a pedestal illustrated with bas-reliefs in the Public Garden at Boston.

On the return from Paris of the American works of art exhibited there, they were placed in the National Academy, conspicuous among them the Indian Hunter. At the close of this exhibition the statue passed into the hands of the Central Park Commissioners, by whom it was placed in the position it now occupies, west of the south end of the Mall, near the Marble Arch, where it is pointed to with pride as the first unmistakable expression of American art in sculpture- American in subject, but the son of a western farmer, the pupil of a native sculptor- a work thoroughly unconventional in treatment, bearing no impress whatever of the influence of a foreign school, and indigenous expression of the New World's genius.

Soon followed the commission for the statue to commemorate the bravery of the Seventh Regiment of the N.Y.S.N.G., a heroic figure in bronze, some time since completed by the artist, but yet to be erected in the Park. Before the completion of this commission, the statue of Shakespeare for the Park was talked of, and for this Ward made several designs, one of which was approved of by the Commissioners. To execute this work a larger studio was necessary, and as our artist was now comparatively wealthy, and the future looked fair indeed, he purchased the site on Forty-ninth street near Fifth avenue, where he erected a home for himself and for one who, during the long years of his trials, had sustained him as a woman's loving, hopeful nature only can sustain. Here also he built his studio, in the rear of his dwelling-house, and prepared to put his noblest thought in the colossal shape in which it is to be given to