Art Out-of-Doors 
preciate all their special qualities. We can 
all recognize our friends when we meet 
them ; but something more than this power 
is needed by the painter when he wants to 
compose a picture of many figures, or to 
draw a face which shall have a given expres- 
sion ; and something more by the connois- 
seur if he is properly to estimate and thor- 
oughly to enjoy the artist's work. And as 
the painter and the connoisseur study and 
assimilate all they see, so too should the 
landscape-gardener and, no less, the lover 
of Nature, if they want to understand and 
enjoy all that is offered them, either in the 
unassisted work of Nature or in that which 
Nature and the artist have produced in 
partnership. Taste is the guide we need, 
and taste means the cultivation of our own 
perceptive powers, not the learning of cut- 
and-dried aesthetic formulas. 
To study art as a preparation for the study 
and appreciation of Nature may seem, at 
first thought, a reversal of the right order of 
things. But it is a very wise thing to do. 
If a painter were never anything more 
266 
