PAINTING. LANDSCAPE PAINTING. JANDSCAPE painting is comparatively a course, long before Titian, you find painters painting sky, and sea, and mountains, and trees, and painting them with extreme beauty and skill. But you will not find a single instance amongst the early Italians of a picture existing wholly or primarily for the sake of its landscape. Nay, more than this; you will find scarcely an instance in which the land scape is much more than a beautifully designed sur- It is a matter of wonder that the art of landscape painting, which is now so popular, should have been such a late development of art! The answer to that question would lead us probably into a somewhat diffi-¦ cult discussion hardly suited to these pages. But we may say this-in early times, nature, as we call it, was not rejoiced in by the people as it is nowadays, because it was for them full of known or dreaded perils, and they cared neither to visit it, nor to look at its repre sentation. Many of these perils were real, such for instance as those of a robber or a wild beast; some were imaginary, such as those from supernatural beings. If every time you went up to a mountain you were in dread of meeting a spirit, and every time you went into a forest you were in dread of meeting a robber or a wild beast, you would not much care about going up mountains or into forests, nor would you eare about paintings of these dreadful places. But bye-and-bye civilization increased, superstition passed away, people came to be more and more at their ease with nature, and able to gaze on her with enjoyment. TECHNIQUE. The first business of a student is to learn how to re produce with exactness the scene before him or her. When you go out to draw, determine that you will do your best to match the colors and the tones of the land scape as nearly as ever you can. Do not be content with imperfect knowledge and resources. Do not try to DETAIL.-MASS.-TONE. The great difficulty which most peopple find when they begin landscape painting from nature, arises from detail. Detail is a terrible task. Let us by way of illustration try and imagine some simple scene. Supposing then, we want to paint-shall we say a cottage, with some trees in the back-ground, and in front a stream in which they are reflected. Now, in the trees there will be visible innumerable leaves, no doubt, and branches, and variations of color, In the roof it is perfectly certain that there will be a thousand tints, and in the walls a thousand streaks and reflected lights and tours and then all this more or less over again in the water with increased intricacy. Most amateurs when they sit down to paint such a thing, begin trying bit by bit to copy each leaf and twig, and tile and stain. One knows so well the result -a thin, toneless unproportional drawing, that has no true art-value whatever. Well, the first thing is to forget absolutely all detail, and to aim simply at mass and tone; to aim simply at getting down a ground-work of the general color, which shall be true in its broad relation of light and dark, and of tint. Into this you may work any amount of detail you choose; but unless you have got this, all detail is worthless, and when you have gotten it, when your tone acquired by broad relation of light and dark and of tint; true, even supposing, that you carry the drawing no further, it has real value as a representation of the scene, and as a a piece of art. You will find it an excellent plan at the commencement of a drawing to half-close your eyes as you look at the landscape; in this way you will shut out all detail and will see the scene before you as a whole; you will see it in its broad relations, that is, of light and dark, and of tint. It is exceedingly useful too, when you have the time, to first of all make a pencil sketch of the scene on the same principle, attending, that is, wholly You will get these down rightly with greater ease, because you will not have to be thinking yet of what the colors are and have to match them. When you have got your black and white study correct, using your pencil, we should advise you, as one uses charcoal, rubbing it, that is, with your finger, then on a new piece of paper begin coloring, keeping the pencil study by you as your scheme of mass and tone. to masses and tone. BLOCKS.-BODY COLOR.-INK.-COLORS. Unless you have a long while before you, and can return to your subject again and again, so as to work it carefully out, we advise you not to make your landscape studies too large. For a morning's or an afternoon's work a block the size of a piece of note-paper folded out, or even of a piece of note-paper folded in two, as we ordinarily write on it, is large enough. Paint on white paper, and on white paper that has a tolerable but not too rough grain. You will find it useful to use body-color with a fair sized brush, and in a fluid state; when you are commencing your drawing, when you are getting in the broad relation of light and dark, and of tint. Into the body-color, while it is still fluid, work different tints more or less pure as you want them; then, when the ground-work is dry, draw into it the main form, with a pen charged with indelible brown ink, and then work on towards finishing with pure colors. You need not in this way fear that your drawing will look chalky; it will not in the least, if you work your pure colors in with tolerable skill. And as for the brown pen-lines, also they will disappear if you like to work on them enough. As to colors, it is well to have a moderate number only in one's box. The following list will serve you for painting most ordinary landscapes. Raw umber, burnt sienna, raw sienna, light red, rose madder, brown madder, aureolin, cobalt blue, visidian, olive green, black and chinese white. Every artist, of course, has special colors that he or she is fond of, just as he or she has special methods; but with these colors you will be able to do most of what you find to do as soon as you get a tolerable facility in combining them. SKETCHING. Amateurs are exceedingly fond of what they call sketching. We all know what that generally comes to -to going out and choosing some large piece of landscape, and then making nonsense of it; spoiling a piece of paper with something which has no drawing, no tone, no color, but which is purely rubbish. Fly from the temptation to sketc, has you would fly from the evil one itself. If you do not really feel that you can muster energy enough to learn how to draw and how to color, do not set your hand to the business at all. But if you do, go to nature and to the masters reverently continuing, and try to let this witchery work on you, You may not do grudging no pains or no sacrifice. great things, but if you have any true art instinct at all you will in time do some beautiful things, things which however small and quiet, it is well to do; they will bring you happiness, and they will bring some others, for whom it is worth thinking, happiness also. PAINTING ON TERRA COTTA. In painting on terra-cotta it is best to treat your whole subject first of all in light and shade, with white enamel, using it thinly for the shadows, and thickiy in the light. As the unglazed pottery is more absorbent than the glazed, more oil is required in the enamel when used for this purpose than for ordinary work. Remember that the brush must never be filled with enamel, but take as much on the tip as it will hold, and you will begin to replenish it for every brush-mark. It will not be found at all easy to do this well, as white enamel is difficult to lay on cleanly and smoothly, until the student has had a good deal of practice. When the whole design has been painted in this manner, it must be fired, and then, if the white has been put on sufficiently thickly, the design will be glazed. You may then tint it with the ordinary china-painting colors and have it re-fired. The chief difficulty in painting on terra-cotta will be overcome if your subject is well chosen. Let the flowers be of a simple, open nature, such as daisies, harthorn, blackthorn, wild roses, any sort of fruit blossoms, buttercups, or primroses. Any of those and many others are very appropriate, and look well; but if the stu |