The material for a history of the development of New Orleans
along intellectual and artistic lines probably does not exist in
anything like completeness, but sufficient data is available to
enable us to form some idea of that development in one or two
sections. The musical and dramatic history of the city is given
elsewhere. In the present chapter the attempt will be made to
trace the evolution of the city's art institutions, and its
libraries and museums. It is a fact not generally known that
prior to the civil war New Orleans was one of the principal art
centers of the United States. The wealth and culture of the
inhabitants attracted to the city many of the leading American
painters, works from whose brushes are still rescued from time
to time from the grime of auction rooms or the attics of
dilapidated homes. Such private collections as those of James
Robb and Burnside would have lent importance to any community.
When Robb's collection was sold, on February 26, 1859, sixty-
seven canvases of importance wer