Who and what is Mr. Bartholdi?  He is a native of Colmar, in Alsace, and comes of a good stock; a pupil of the Lycee Louis-le-Grand, and of Ary Scheffer, he studied first painting then sculpture, and after a journey in the East with Gerome, established his atelier in Paris.  He served in the irregular corps of Garibaldi during the war of 1870, and the following year visited the United States.  It is admitted that he is a man of talent, but that he is not considered a great sculptor in his own country is equally beyond doubt.  He would not be compared, for instance, with such men as Chapu, Dubois, Falguiere, Clesinger, Mercie, Fremiet, men who stand in the front rank of their profession.  The list of his works is not long.  It includes statues of General Rapp, Vercingetorix, Vauban, Champollion, Lafayette and Rouget de l’Isle; ideal groups entitled “Genius in the Grasp of Misery,” and “the Malediction of Alsace;” busts of Messrs. Erckmann and Chatrain; single figures called “Le Vigneron,” “Genie Funebre” and “Peace;” and a monument to Martin Schoengauer in the form of a fountain for the courtyard of the Colmar Museum.  There may be a few others.  Last, but by no means least, there is the great Lion of Belfort, his best work.  This is about 91 by 52 feet in dimensions, and is carved from a block of reddish Vosges stone.  It is intended to commemorate the defence of Belfort against the German army in 1870, an episode of heroic interest.  The immense animal is represented as wounded but still capable of fighting, half lying, half standing, with an expression of rage and mighty defiance.  It is not too much to say that Mr. Bartholdi in this case has shown a fine appreciation of the requirements of colossal sculpture.  He has sacrificed all unnecessary details, and, taking a lesson from the old Egyptian stone-cutters, has presented an impressive arrangement of simple masses and unvexed surfaces which give to the composition a marvellous breadth of effect.  The lion is placed in a sort of rude niche on the side of a rocky hill, which is the foundation of the fortress of Belfort.  It is visible at a great distance, and is said to be strikingly noble from every point of view.  The idea is not original, however well it may have been carried out, for the Lion of Lucerne by Thorwaldsen is its prototype on a smaller scale and commemorates an event of somewhat similar character.  The bronze equestrian statue of Vercingetorix, the fiery Gallic chieftain, in the Clermont museum, is full of violent action.  The horse is flying along with his legs in positions which set all the science of Mr. Muybridge at defiance; the man is brandishing his sword and half-turning in his saddle to shout encouragement to his followers.  The whole is supported by a bit of artificial rock-work under the horse, and the body of a dead Gaul lies close beside it.  In the statue of Rouget de l’Isle we see a young man striking an orator’s attitude, with his right arm raised in a gesture which seems to say: