the truth shown to us in pictures is often the first glimpse which we get of it, since we set our minds to examine and study pictures, whereas the daily cares and occupations of life leave little inclination or time with the majority now-a-days for seeking for the same truths in Nature. And thus it is, that, gradually, the study of the best art leads the mind and inclinations towards the study of that which is far greater than Art-Nature herself.

Therefore, it is far more necessary for us Amateurs to obtain clear knowledge of the truth, and labour in the right path, no matter how far behind excellence our own work may be, through the difficulties that necessarily will beset us, than endeavour, through learning a few dexterous or conventional methods, to produce sketches and "blots" of a world, which is neither in itself a sketch nor a blot. Turner's sketches are not of this kind.* If he had not time in his sketch to finish the entire, he did not daub the whole wrongly; he finished some one bit completely, as a guide to the perfect completion of the rest; and that should be the principle of all students in sketching. Having first got your outline correct, if you then determine that you cannot paint the whole of the picture at that sitting, it is far better for you to finish a part of each distinctive feature of the subject, than, through the feebleness of an imperfect mastery of hand when forced by haste, slur over the whole and render nothing rightly.

I think most people will agree, that one of the chief faults to be found with the landscape painting of amateurs, as evident in the exhibitions of their works lately put before the public, is the almost total want of study to be found in their rendering of the sky. Much cleverness is to be found in their rendering of other facts of nature, this one paints trees well, that one gives clever hints at the sea, this other shows careful study of mountain and moor--but scarcely one of them, in their pictures at least, would seem to look upon the sky as other than a convenient back-ground of colour, and vehicle for the dominant note of brightness or gloom which they intend their picture to possess. There would be nothing wonderful in this, did we suppose that the mind of the landscape painting amateur represented nothing more than the mind of the general public, whose chief concern about the sky is centered in the absorbing question-will the day be wet or fine?

* Sketches should not be confounded with colour notes, where nothing but the colour is aimed at. These will be taken into consideration later on.

It is a strange thing how little in general people know about the sky. It is the part of creation where Nature has done more for the sake of pleasing man, more for the sole and evident purpose of talking to him and teaching him, than in any other of her works, and it is just the part in which we least attend to her. There are not many of her other works in which some more material or essential purpose than the mere pleasing of man is not answered by every part of their organization; but every essential purpose of the sky might, so far as we know, be answered if once every three days or thereabouts a great, ugly big rain-cloud were brought up over the blue, and everything well watered, and so all left blue again till next time, with perhaps a flow of morning and evening mist for dew. And instead of this, there is not a moment of any day of our lives when nature is not producing scene after scene, picture after picture, glory after glory, and working still upon such exquisite and constant principles of the most perfect beauty, that it is quite certain it is all done for us, and intended for our perpetual pleasure. And every man, wherever placed, however far from other sources of interest and beauty, has this doing for him constantly. The noblest scenes of the earth can be seen and known but by few; it is not intended that man should live always in the midst of them; he injures them by his presence, he ceases to feel them if he be always with them but the sky is for all; bright as it is, it is not

'too bright or good

For human nature's daily food;"

it is fitted in all its functions for the perpetual comfort and exalting of the heart, for soothing it and purifying it from its dross and dust."

In spite of this fact, man scarcely deigns to look at it, unless it be to learn the weather. He will cross leagues of sea and land to look for a little space on what he thinks to be the most stupendous of material things, the great mountain ranges crowned with eternal snow and yet, if he cares to examine into the matter, he will find that none of these are more stupendous or grander in their forms than the masses of sunlit cumulus he will find at home, some one day out of ten, piled upon the horizon towards the north. True, there is not the same sense of the sublime to be obtained from these clouds as that given by a range of the Alps; they are not everlasting hills-they come but for a little while, and vanish as swiftly-but none the less should their forms and colours be studied and enjoyed, since they are themselves often far more stupendous and beautiful than any mountain range on earth.

How many of us, professedly loving Nature, have stored up in our memories the light and loveliness of a single sunset? We have kept recollection, no doubt, of many other scenes-scenes often spoiled by man; but these scenes, fresh from the hand of God, we either do not look at, or they pass unregretted. If we

*Modern Painters." Vol. I., Part ii., § iii., Cap. 1.

1

do remember anything distinctly concerning the sky, is it not the blackness of storm-cloud, the white glare of lightning, rather than the quiet intensity of the peace of God's presence, the "clear obscure of autumn sunset," the "silence and wide mystery" of summer dawn, or the noontide's slumberous repose of light and cloud shadow on the distant hill? What have we to tell of these hours, when, did we but listen, we might have heard "the voice of God, walking in His garden at the cool of day?" For it is the same now as of old-He comes not in the tempest, nor in the earthquake, nor in the lightning, but in the "still, small voice."

I do not know anything more typical of how the finest feeling may sometimes be led astray, than the instance shown in Wordsworth's poem, "Nature and the Poet, suggested by a picture of Peele Castle in a storm, painted by Sir George Beaumont." The Poet, left to his own inner teachings, felt the full sublimity of the old ruin as he himself saw it day by day beneath a peaceful sky, "its image ever sleeping in a glassy sea"-" the mighty deep seeming ever the gentlest of all gentle things." But the lampblack and lightning of Sir George Beaumont changes his mood. A poet is very often the worst judge of a picture. Tell him a wash of Indian ink, and a white patch on the paper, represents a ship in a storm, and he will probably at once transfer his own feelings concerning storms at sea to the picture, and imagine that the picture displays all the grandeur that exists only in his own mind. It is sufficient for him that the notion of a storm is suggested to him. But, on the other hand, show him a picture where all the facts of storm are fully worked out, and he will quarrel with whatever facts in the picture differ with his own previous feelings conceived on the subject. This, perhaps, accounts for the fact that, though Wordsworth may be truly considered the Turner of the poets, we find no sonnet by him to Turner or Sir Joshua Reynolds, and we do to Sir George Beaumont and Haydon. We may also remember that Scott consented that Turner should illustrate him on protest -because he " seems just now to be the fashion." And, so, when Wordsworth sees Sir George Beaumont's picture of Peele Castle, he takes himself to task for having found sublimity in the mood in which he himself beheld it, almost turning his devotion away from the facts of Nature to the "passionate work" of his friend; and he vows he will think of Peele Castle ever after, not as he saw it, but as his friend pourtrayed it. It will not be rash to say

that there is far more sublimity in the picture of this Castle, by Turner, in South Kensington-a sunset of ineffable calm-than in the "passionate work" of Sir George Beaumont.

Most people's notions about the sky are conventional, largely borrowed from the skies of the old masters. Let us now enquire what are the principal phenomena which the sky manifests? and, to be systematic, we shall begin at the beginning.

THE OPEN SKY is the colour of the pure atmosphere-the pure azote and oxygen that lie between us and space. This colour is modified by two circumstances. FIRST, by the quantity of aqueous vapour which it holds in suspension. SECOND, by the condition in which this vapour exists. The first circumstance modifies the colour of the sky, inasmuch as the greater the quantity of aqueous vapour suspended, the paler will be the colour. Its colour is modified by the second circumstance that, when the aqueous vapour is in complete solution, it remains invisible, and when in imperfect solution it becomes visible, resulting in what we know as "cloud." Between this absolute condition of local vapour in imperfect solution and aqueous vapour in complete solution, there lie all the infinite gradations between cloud and simple haze. We may, therefore, say, that for our purposes the sky should be considered as a region of atmosphere of vast depth, at different altitudes of which aqueous vapours are suspended in varying density, and in various degrees of solution.

These are facts you all know. How many of them do you strive to render? Are you content when you have painted the colour of your sky evenly with the masses of cloud neatly isolated-caring nothing if the blue which you have laid on represents a solid roof, against which, did it so exist in Nature, an adventurous æronaut would be in imminent danger of bursting his balloon? Each of us can best answer that question as regards ourselves. At least, we see now that such representation of the open sky is not the true one; and that the beauties which it manifests are equalled by the difficulties which beset the artist who would paint them. Let us glance at the chief facts which we must strive to render.

Go to the window of a room facing the north, on a clear day, take a piece of white paper in your hand, and notice the following facts. The colour of the paper, held towards the light, tells as distinct light against everything up to the horizon. But the moment it is held in opposition to the blue of the sky, it becomes

a shadow compared with it, in spite of the fact that it is white and the sky is blue. This distinctly proves the fact that the sky is not mere blue colour-it is "blue fire," so to speak, actually holding light within it. I draw your attention to this to begin with, to show you your limitations. That white paper which you hold in your hand in the ordinary daylight of your room is the highest light at your disposal in painting—and yet it is distinct darkness compared with what must be evident to you to be by no means the highest light in the landscape before you. No doubt, if you took the paper into the glare of sunshine, and held it turned to the sun and against this blue sky, it would then tell distinctly as a high light against the sky. But your picture is to be viewed in ordinary daylight; therefore, it is the value of white paper, or paint under that condition, that you must consider.

You see now that, if you attempt to paint the blue sky as strong in colour as it is in Nature, you will sacrifice its light. It is all very well for artists to do this when they have to paint only a patch of blue here and there showing through a rift in the clouds. The general truth of the picture will not be then lost, since the balance of light can be rendered in the masses of cloud. But we are now considering the open sky, and I must impress upon you that you cannot render the sunlight it holds and the depth of the blue colour at the same time. Knowing, therefore, now that we must subordinate colour to chiaroscuro, the blue must be lessened in depth of colour, and the light maintained.*

If you look at the Nicholas Poussin-" The Sacrifice of Isaac " in the National Gallery, you will find there the solecism which an artist may be guilty of when he attempts to render both depth of blue, and maintain the relation of light in the sky to the distance of the horizon. He paints the sky intense, even blue down to a few degrees of the horizon, and then discovering he cannot make his distance tell against such dark colour, he serenely ceases to use the blue colour, and paints the remaining hands-breadth of sky at the horizon with pure, unmixed yellow! Such a glaring absurdity as this is beyond all excuse, yet this picture, I believe, is considered a particularly fine specimen of ancient Landscape art. One cannot, however, think of the skies of the early Italian masters with other than the utmost admiration. It would seem, indeed, as if they had

* One of the first charms in Corot's work, is his rendering of the light in the sky by subordinating the depth of the blue to it.