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ON TASTE IN ORNAMENTAL DESIGN. Paet II. 



the costly ; but the selection of the beautiful depends on the 

 judgment ; and good proportion, form, and other conditions, 

 may be met with in articles of use or ornament without their 

 being necessarily expensive. This should be borne in mind 

 by all who despair of obtaining them because their means are 

 limited. We have only to look at the bad taste displayed in the 

 over-furnished rooms of many wealthy individuals to be con- 

 vinced of the fact, that good taste does not necessarily belong 

 to the richest members of the community, or that the posses- 

 sion of tasteful designs is confined to people of ample means. 

 [Many a simple and cheap object may be made in good taste 

 without any additional cost ; and the humblest individuals 

 may display an innate perception of the beautiful in the ordi- 

 nary ornaments of a cottage, or in the coarsest materials.] 

 The commonest pottery, worth a few pence, may have far more 

 to recommend it than a splendid Sevres vase which costs some 

 hundreds of pounds ; and the one may possess real beauty, 

 while the value of the other may consist only in the difficulty 

 of manufacturing it. One may be a work of taste, the other of 

 skill, or caprice, and be, in a fact, a mere curiosity. 



It is not necessary that the purchaser or the maker should 

 have the means of expending large sums to obtain, or to pro- 

 duce, any objects of taste ; but each must possess a feeling for 

 the beautiful ; and it is of special importance to a manufac- 

 turing country like England that good things should be made, 

 which will claim, both abroad and at home, the admiration 

 of those who are capable of appreciating them. Nothing 

 encourages the sale of manufactures so much as their excel- 

 lence in point of taste (at least when the public are alive to 

 their merits), and in the words of the far-seeing Necker, " le 

 gout est le plus adroit de tous les commerces." We are often 

 surprised at the want of taste shown by the English shop- 

 keepers in the arrangement of objects for sale ; and this is 

 particularly striking to any one who has just seen the success- 



