210 ART IN PHOTOGRAPHY. 



attention to No. 1054, This is a wide panorama diagonally 

 cut in two by a straight line, which is its most prominent 

 feature. That feature is a railway train at a stand still, 

 whose passengers and ofEcials are all staring at the camera. 

 Looked at from an artistic point of view — not commendable. 

 Or No. 1039 — a pretty bit of composition in itself ; but scarcely 

 improved either by the enginemeu in the foreground, surveying 

 the camera (instead of tending their iron steed), or by the 

 remarkable feature of a man fishing in apparently shallow 

 water, with an untrimmed sapling-trunk for a rod, whose 

 attention is concentrated, not on his imaginary bait or float, but 

 on the camera. 



But let it not be inferred that it is an easy matter to pose 

 people gracefully ; on the contrary, it is not to be done, as a 

 rule, without much pains and patience. Many a charming 

 picture one sees and longs to secure, truly artistic and natural — 

 e.g. children picking flowers by the wayside, neighbours having 

 a friendly gossip by the cottage-door, the pretty girl with the 

 pitcher at the well, etc ; but let him only commence setting up 

 his apparatus, and all picturesqueness forthwith vanishes ; in 

 spite of earnest entreaties to his subjects to remain "as they 

 were," they almost invariably pose themselves as if they were 

 playing at soldiers on drill, and the camera had just uttered 

 the magic word " attention." 



