The Muybridge Run. 67 



of a friend, herself no mean artist, and of de- 

 cidedly strong artistic taste and correct judgment, 

 whose ideas of Turner had been founded solely 

 on what she had read, or seen and heard in Amer- 

 ica, and whose prejudice against his apparently 

 overwrought work was excessive. For a full hour 

 few words were passed. Then, rising to go : " If 

 I sit here any longer, I shall end by liking the 

 man ! " quoth she. 



It seems to me that the power in these Muy- 

 bridge photographs grows upon you. It is uni- 

 versally acknowledged that one does not see the 

 running horse as he is usually drawn ; in other 

 words, that the artist's run is incorrect. Now, if 

 the retina has anything impressed upon it, it must 

 assuredly be either one of the positions actually 

 taken by the galloping animal, or else a mere blur 

 of motion. The artist draws a blurred wheel be- 

 cause he sees it blurred, and it suggests rapid mo- 

 tion. But he will not draw blurred legs, because 

 such drawing will not suggest what he desires to 

 convey in his picture. And yet, if he is true to 

 what his eye has seen, he must draw some of the 

 positions the horse has been in, and not positions 

 which he cannot by any possibility have passed 

 through in this gait. I take it for granted that 

 the eye catches the gathered positions, and these 

 are the ones in which the horse is entirely in the 

 air, with his legs under his girths, and with hind 



