Howard Pyle, a chronicle by Charles D. Abbott, with an introduction by N. C. Wyeth and many illustrations from Howard Pyle's works.

THE SPIRIT OF AMERICA
influenced Howard Pyle to set about the making of the pic-.
tures. When they were completed and published in 1894
they came just too late to "delight the good old doctor,"
but they were so genial in their manner, so distinctly adapted
to his work, that had the author been -alive he would
undoubtedly have been the first to hail them as admirable.
Just eighteen years after the publication of that first historical painting, "Carnival, Philadelphia, 1778," he had in
Harper-'s Monthly a series of paintings in illustration to
Woodrow Wilson's "George Washington." In the mean--ý
time there had been a host of pictures dealing with history
in some form or other; single pictures such as "The First
Visit of William Penn to America," 1 and "Washington
Taking Leave of His Officers";2 illustrations for a historical
novel, In the Valley,' by Harold Frederic; decorations for
S. Weir Mitchell's Quaker Lady;` and numerous pen-andinks illustrating stories and articles of various kinds. Each
of these had added greatly to his reputation for the drawing
of historical pictures and had brought about a great demand
for his work in this field. Consequently when the Harpers
secured the biography of George Washington which they
intended to feature in the magazine, there was no illustrator
who could command attention with such certainty as could
Howard Pyle.
Alden, the editor of Harper's Monthly, wrote to him
on August 20, i1895: "Professor Woodrow Wilson is
preparing for our magazine six papers on George Washington. His first paper, treating the Virginia of Washington's
'Harper's Weekly, March 31, 1883, Vol. xxvii, P. 199 -2 Ibid., December 1, 1883, vol. xxvii, P. 767.
*Scribner's Magazine, beginning September, 1889, vol. vi, p. 284.
'Harper's New. Monthly Magazine, November, 1 890, vol. lxxxi, p. 933.
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