losses occurring while the engines were absent.
As to the contract in the policy, we have often seen clauses requiring
the insured to notify the company of any circumstances affecting the
risk, of which the absence of the town engines might be considered one,
so, in our ignorance, we, and, we imagine, a good many others, would be
glad to have an authoritative statement from the companies themselves on
the subject.

* * * * *

According to the _Wiener Bauindustrie Zeitung_, the splendid Brunswick
monument at Geneva is on the point of falling down. Every one remembers
the history of this structure, which was erected in 1879, at a cost of
six hundred thousand dollars, to the memory of Charles the Second of
Brunswick, the "Diamond Duke," as he was called by the Germans, who,
after his expulsion from his principality by his subjects, on account of
his extravagance and general worthlessness, took up his residence in
Geneva, and, on his death, in 1873, bequeathed all his property, about
four million dollars, to the city. The municipality was grateful enough
to carry out in a very sumptuous manner the last wishes of its
benefactor, who desired to be commemorated by a monument in the style of
the later Scaliger tomb at Verona, and from the designs of Frauel was
erected the hexagonal Gothic pavilion, surmounted by an equestrian
statue of the Duke, which is so well known to architects. The Veronese
prototype of the monument is a tolerably insecure affair, but the modern
imitation is still larger and heavier, and two years after its
completion the substructure began to come to pieces. It was then clamped
with metal, but water got into the joints, and further repairs were soon
necessary. In 1883, the Carrara marble of which it was built had so far
decayed that the rebuilding of the whole with more durable stone was
seriously proposed; and now, examination, having shown that the whole
affair is likely to collapse at any moment, the city authorities have
asked for authority to raise eight thousand dollars, by loan, to put it
in secure condition. To tell the truth, it would not be an irreparable
loss to the world to have the structure go to ruin. An imitation of an
existing monument is not likely to be a very inspiring work of art, and
this was not extremely successful, even as an imitation; while the
historical fact which it immortalized, that the last representative of
one of the six great German princ