ITALY: Mussolini Praised

President Calvin Coolidge, Charles Evans Hughes, Will H. Hays and Mrs. Edward L. Doheny are among sitters who have sat for portraits to Howard Chandler Christy, deft and prolific creator of girl head covers for magazines. Last week Artist & Mrs. Christy reached Manhattan on the Italian Liner Conte Rosso (Red Count). Soon impertinent newsgatherers were asking: “Did you paint Mussolini?” Broad and smug came an answering smile from the left-handed little man who gets $1,700 for a magazine cover. Quietly he replied that among his luggage was a portrait for which Il Duce had posed three times. . . . Mrs. Christy, vivacious, cut in. Cried she: “Mussolini is the most marvelous man I ever knew. He has charm, personality, strength, a sense of humor. He is a genius! He is so wonderful that every other man you meet after you have seen him seems flat and dull!” Artist Christy, fired by his wife to enthusiasm, cried: “Mussolini is perfect. … He let us do anything we wanted—anything. … I could go in for a sitting feeling pretty low. One look at him and I was filled with enthusiasm. He radiates power, and you catch some of it from him!” Calm, Artist Christy announced that he would at once put on view at his apartment (No. 1 West 67th St., Manhattan) not only his new portrait of Mussolini but another depicting Crown Prince Humberto of Italy.