60 MEMOIR OF FLEEMING JENKIN 



from their places ; the whole spirit of Japan, he 

 told me, was pictured in that box ; that plain piece 

 of carpentry was as much inspired by the spirit of 

 perfection as the happiest drawing or the finest 

 bronze and he who could not enjoy it in the one 

 was not fully able to enjoy it in the others. Thus, 

 too, he found in Leonardo's engineering and ana- 

 tomical drawings a perpetual feast ; and of the 

 former he spoke even with emotion. Nothing 

 indeed annoyed Fleeming more than the attempt 

 to separate the fine arts from the arts of handicraft ; 

 any definition or theory that failed to bring these 

 two together, according to him, had missed the 

 point ; and the essence of the pleasure received 

 lay in seeing things well done. Other qualities 

 must be added ; he was the last to deny that ; but 

 this, of perfect craft, was at the bottom of all. 

 And on the other hand, a nail ill-driven, a joint ill- 

 fitted, a tracing clumsily done, anything to which 

 a man had set his hand and not set it aptly, moved 

 him to shame and anger. With such a character, 

 he would feel but little drudgery at Fairbairn's. 

 There would be something daily to be done, slovenli- 

 ness to be avoided, and a higher mark of skill to 

 be attained ; he would chip and file, as he had 

 practised scales, impatient of his own imperfection 

 but resolute to learn. 



And there was another spring of delight. For 

 he was now moving daily among those strange 



