Composite Photography.

To obtain the typical representation of a class is something that painters and novelists have always professed to do, and it is something which they have nearly always failed in accomplishing. The individual traits and feelings of the artist have necessarily shown out strongly in his work, and in spite of his endeavors to throw off his prejudices, his hand can always be recognized, and the final result is never satisfactory. A writer who is thoroughly unprejudiced is yet to be found, but photography has given us a means by which a typical portrait of a number of individuals can readily be arrived at. A negative of each person is taken separately; these are then all photographed or combined upon one plate, and from this the picture is transferred to paper. As the images of the faces of each individual are exactly timed, so they have an equal effect upon the sensitiy plate, the result is an average picture of the whole number of persons photographed. This is especially interesting, since the peculiarities of the individuals have disappeared, and the whole is, as it were, an idealised image of the class.

Mr. John T. Stoddard of Smith College, and an enthusiast on the subject, who has already written an article on the subject in the "Century" for March, 1887, is desirous of securing a composite photograph of the present senior class at Harvard for illustration of an article which he intends to write for the same magazine, and for which he has already a number of composite photographs of students in various colleges.

The photographer will be in Cambridge on Wednesday and Thursday, May 18 and 19, and it is necessary, if the experiment is to be successful, that at least a hundred and fifty seniors be photographed. The time consumed for each sitting will not be over five or ten minutes, and as the room in which the photographer will carry on his work is to be in the yard, the trouble to be incurred will be very small.

B.