28 PRACTICAL HINTS ON

Plate VIII. Jig. 1. la this design, K The Lauding of Charles II,"
West has placed the principal figure in the middle of the picture. Com-
mencing his composition at the nighest point, he carries on his group until
it ends in the distance. Neither in the situation of the hero, nor in the
form of the group, does he seem solicitous to hide the science. He has
brought the nigh point in contact with the shadow, and strengthened it by
the female whom the boy accompanies, being dressed in strong dark:
when this is brought sharp off the ground, as is the case also in Jig. 2, it
enables us to keep the other figures in their places better than by
diminishing the firmness of their shadows or colours.

Fig. 2. " Cattle returning Home in a Shower." In this composition the
principal light falls on the convex part of the group, and the depth of the
shadow is assisted by the local colour of the objects placed in it. The
goat in the foreground is connected to the rest by some white flowers of
an elder bush, which cannot be expressed in an outline. As this is from
a design of my late brother's, I cannot allow this opportunity to pass
without expressing the great loss I feel in not having his assistance, not
only in these notes, but in every thing connected with the art: though
practising painting but for a short time of a short life, his strength of
mind, his fine eye for colour, and a taste for the beauties of pastoral
painting, convince me the English School has lost one that would have
been an ornament to that department of the science.

Fig. 3. Is a repetition of the same form.

Plate IX. This plate consists of Wilkie's admirable composition of
the Blind Fiddler, the Salutation of the Virgin by Rembrandt, and a
Dance by Ostade. I shall leave it to the student's own judgment to
investigate the various forms on which these compositions depend.

By making the principal heads depend upon one mode of arrangement,