There is much in it to arouse the reflective and inventive
faculties of our Daguerreotypists. They have heretofore stumbled
along with very little knowledge of the true theory of their art,
and yet the quality of their productions is far in advance
of those of the French and English artists, most of whose
establishments I have had the pleasure of visiting I feel therefore,
that when a sufficient amount of theoretic knowledge shall have
been added to this practical skill on the part of our operators,
and when they shall have been made fully acquainted with what has
been attained or attempted by others, a still greater advance
in the art will be manifested.

A GOOD Daguerreotypist is by no means a mere machine following
a certain set of fixed rules. Success in this art requires
personal skill and artistic taste to a much greater degree
than the unthinking public generally imagine; in fact more than
is imagined by nine-tenths of the Daguerreotypists themselves.
And we see as a natural result, that while the business numbers
its thousands of votaries, but few rise to any degree of eminence.
It is because they look upon their business as a mere mechanical
operation, and having no aim or pride beyond the earning of their
daily bread, they calculate what will be a fair per centage
on the cost of their plate, case, and chemicals, leaving MIND,
which is as much CAPITAL as anything else (where it is exercised,)
entirely out of the question.

The art of taking photographs on PAPER, of which your work
treats at considerable length, has as yet attracted but little
attention in this country, though destined, as I fully believe,