244 FIELD AND HEDGEROW. 



them like coronals for present ornament and future re 

 galement. These creatures are nevertheless artists. Or 

 the walls of caves they have painted the antelope anc 

 the lion in bright colours ; they have not only caugh 

 the shape and hue of the animals about them, but thei 

 action and movement. The figures are in motion 

 skilfully drawn and full of spirit. 



If any one asks, Is the application of Art to the chas< 

 really so old, so very very old, as this ? I refer them t< 

 the stars. How long ago is it since the constellation 

 received their names ? At what date were they firs 

 arranged in groups ? Upon the most ancient monument 

 and in the most ancient writings they have the sarm 

 forms assigned to them as at this day, and that too ii 

 countries remote from each other. The signs of th< 

 Zodiac are almost as old as the stars themselves ; tha 

 is, as old as the time when the stars were first beheld o 

 human eyes. Amongst them there is the Archer- 

 Sagittarius the chase in the shape of man ; greates 

 and grandest of all the constellations is Orion, the might; 

 hunter, the giant who slew the wild beasts by strength 

 There is no assemblage of stars so brilliant as those whicl 

 compose the outline of Orion ; the Hunter takes the firs 

 place in the heavens. Art exists in the imagination- 

 imagination drew lines from star to star, and repeated it 

 life on earth in the sky. 



So it is true that the first picture whether drawn b; 

 the imagination alone in the constellations, on the wall 

 of the cave with ochre and similar materials, or engrave< 

 with keen splinters of flint on the mammoth's tusk th 

 first picture was of the chase. Animals arc earliest, th 

 human form next, flowers and designs and stories i; 

 drawings next, and landscape last of all. Landscape i 

 peculiarly the art of the moderns it is the art of on 



