292 ARIADNE FLORENTINA. 



our power of outline with white ; and our general laws, thus 

 far determined, will be thick lines in wood ; thin ones in 

 metal ; complete drawing on wood ; sketches, if we choose, 

 on metal. 



81. But why, in wood, lines at all? Why not cut out 

 white spaces, and use the chisel as if its incisions were so 

 much white paint? Many fine pieces of \vood-cutting are 

 indeed executed on this principle. Bewick does nearly all his 

 foliage so ; and continually paints the light plumes of his birds 

 with single touches of his chisel, as if he were laying on white. 



But this is not the finest method of wood-cutting. It im- 

 plies the idea of a system of light and shade in which the 

 shadow is totally black. Now, no light and shade can be 

 good, much less pleasant, in which all the shade is stark 

 black. Therefore the finest wood-cutting ignores light and 

 shade, and expresses only form, and dark local colour. And 

 it is convenient, for simplicity's sake, to anticipate what I 

 should otherwise defer telling you until next lecture, that fine 

 metal engraving, like fine wood-cutting, ignores light and 

 shade ; and that, in a word, all good engraving whatsoever 

 does so. 



82. I hope that my saying so will make you eager to inter- 

 rupt me. ' What ! Rembrandt's etchings, and Lupton's mez- 

 zotints, and Le Keux's line-work, do you mean to tell us 

 that these ignore light and shade ? ' 



I never said that mezzotint ignored light and shade, or 

 ought to do so. Mezzotint is properly to be considered as 

 chiaroscuro drawing on metal. But I do mean to tell you 

 that both Rembrandt's etchings, and Le Keux's finished line- 

 work, are misapplied labour, in so far as they regard chiaro- 

 scuro ; and that consummate engraving never uses it as a 

 primal element of pleasure. 



83. We have now got our principles so far defined that I 

 can proceed to illustration of them by example. 



Here are facsimiles, very marvellous ones,* of two of the 



* By Mr. Burgess. The toil and skill necessary to produce a fac- 

 simile of this degree of precision will only be recognized by the reader 

 who has had considerable experience of actual work. 



