§16,17. IMPORTANCE OF DRAWING. 197 



accounts for the faulty execution in this country of the many 

 common subjects which are so admirably executed in Italy 

 and France by the same class of draughtsmen. It is an in- 

 difference to the necessity of drawing that leads many a tyro, 

 who scarcely has learnt to draw a line correctly (much less to 

 make accurate studies of the human form, or to understand 

 the art of grouping figures in a composition) to lay aside the 

 pencil and adopt the brush ; when he wonders, too late, that 

 he has never been able to display the talent or obtain the 

 credit of an acknowledged artist ; and some even excuse their 

 ignorance of drawing by some fallacy, such as, " there is no 

 outline in nature," as if a real object could be delineated with- 

 out circumscribing its limits.~\ 



It is true that when the whole surface of an object is repre- 

 sented in colour it should have no apparent outline, but it 

 would be difficult to draw the form of any object without 

 one, or to learn to represent it without first defining it by 

 lines. Wisely, indeed, does Cennini urge how " necessary it 

 is you should be accustomed to draw correctly," and the pains 

 taken by the greatest masters of Italy is fully proved by their 

 original drawings. The importance attached to the " line " in 

 ancient times has not only been exemplified by the well-known 

 story of the line drawn within a line by Apelles and Proto- 

 genes, and by the saying " nulla dies sine linea," but is shown 

 by the few specimens of Greek drawing that have come down 

 to us, on walls and vases. And conventional and imperfect 

 as was the art of painting among the Egyptians, their skill in 

 drawing was beyond a question ; as the figures in the un- 

 finished chamber of Belzoni's tomb at Thebes fully prove, 

 where in the outline of an arm of colossal size each portion is 

 drawn at one stroke ; as from the shoulder to the elbow. 

 However deficient in the perfection of art, they could draiv ; 

 and to copy the long bold lines of those figures would be 



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