248 



ON TASTE IN ORNAMENTAL DESIGN. 



Part II. 



merely women. Nor will it be denied that the Beggar- 

 boys of that master, and such like subjects, find far more 

 admirers in this country than his sacred pictures. 



It is not surprising that the uninstructed should begin by 

 admiring what they can understand; and this shows the 

 necessity of that tuition which may enable them to appreciate 

 a higher class of art. The most refined nations began with 

 the rudest designs, before they were capable of producing the 

 nobler conceptions of a more advanced age. Improvement is 

 the result of time and study ; and perfection in the knowledge, 

 as well as in the practice, of art can only be brought about 

 by gradual steps.] The same tendency causes the majority of 

 the people to feel an interest in specimens of natural history 

 at a museum, in preference to works of art ; and the largest 

 crowd at the Great Exhibition of 1851 was collected about the 

 stuffed animals, and the illustrated story of Kenard-the-Fox. 



45. [But, for the present, I wish particularly to direct 

 attention to ornamental design and art-manufactures; and 



Fig. i. 



Fig. 2 



Fig. 3. 



Fig. 4. 



following out the negative process, I shall introduce some 

 faulty objects which are to be avoided ; beginning with those 

 that err chiefly in want of proportion, as in the four given in 



