gent gentlemanly man, about fifty years of age, high in office at the East India House, who never had been able to distinguish any colour sufficiently to name it, nor could designate such otherwise than as comparatively light or dark, and who used to refer to his daughter, whose eyes were excellent, for their nominal distinctions. He used spectacles, but his eyes were not otherwise defective.

In the Philosophical Transactions for 1738 is an account of persons to whom all objects appeared red after having eaten henbane-roots.

In the same journal for 1777, p. 250, one Harris is mentioned who could not tell black from white. He had two brothers equally defective, one of whom mistook orange for green. Again, (Phil. Trans. 1778, p. 613.) to another person full reds and full greens appeared alike, but yellows and dark blues were very nicely distinguished.

It is remarkable that in those cases of defective vision in which the eye is insensible to either of the primary colours, the party so defective confounds with, or regards such colour as, its opposite or contrasting colour.

This phenomenon is easily explained upon our principle of vision and colours, and the fact we have demonstrated in the preceding Experiments, III. VII. XII. XIII. that each colour contains virtually all the others; whence, if the eye be insensible to red, a red object even will appear to be green, and so of other cases. The rationale of a good or bad eye for colours rests upon the same ground, which depends upon the health or infirmity of the organ; and there can be no doubt that cultivation may very greatly improve the sensibility of the eye with regard to colours, as exercise strengthens the powers of the mind, and increases the health, vigour, and dexterity of the body: this is evident in the case of myopes, or the short-sighted, in whom the eye for colours is commonly deficient.

Inasmuch as a man is deficient in any sense, he is still unborn; whence those who are defective of vision are unconscious of, and never suspect, their own incapacity; yet the want of a good eye has not prevented some very eminent men from attaining high reputation in painting in spite of defective colouring; nor has it prevented others from investigating and writing on colours: nevertheless it is probable that much discordance in the theory of colours may have arisen upon this foundation. A late Professor of painting expresses himself upon this subject like one born blind or who had never seen colours, and many natural philosophers appear to have been remarkably deficient in this sense. Newton confesses that his eye for distinguishing colours was not very critical, and that he availed himself of assistance in this respect. Mr. Dalton could not distinguish blue from pink by daylight.† Professor Sanderson, who was born, or very early became, blind, delivered lectures upon light and colours; and Dr. Priestley mentions an artist living in Edinburgh whose companions "have, by putting his colours out of the order in which he keeps them, sometimes made him give a gentleman a green beard, and paint a beautiful young lady with a pair of blue cheeks!"

Note H, page 40.

The effect of any colour intently view, in producing its opposite colour as an ocular spectrum; the effects of two colours of the prismatic spectrum, when cast separately into the two eyes

at the same time, in producing a compound sensation in the observer; the effects of colours contrasted contiguously in balancing or subduing each other by a similar combination; the like effects of transparent colours in glazing or mixture; the harmonizing influences of colours, and the whole doctrine of equivalence, are all attributable to the same principles.

Note I, page 60.

As the eye of the artist is apt to be influenced in painting by surrounding colours, and as the same circumstance powerfully affects his finished works, the colour of the walls of the study, and gallery of the artist, and their accordance, are no unimportant aid or hinderance to good colouring; it has accordingly excited his attention with various results. The late academician Tresham, and his colleagues in the office of arranging the Townley collection of statues at the British Museum, found much difficulty in colouring the walls of the galleries in accordance with the best appearance of sculptures become dingy by age, owing to the well-known property of a plane surface, or mass of any particular colour, to obtrude or come forward upon the eye to the detriment of the relief of the statues, and the power of some hues to augment by contrast the foulness of their colour; both of which difficulties they ultimately overcame by sprinkling, or marbling, the walls with a second or third colour; upon which the walls retired from the eye, and the statues relieved, without any disadvantage from contrast, notwithstanding their having rather injudiciously adopted a warm advancing colour, better suited to a picturegallery.

The principle which succeeded with the academicians in placing these statues has been carried into the painting-room and picture-gallery, perhaps irrelevantly and with ill effect, for pictures are in this respect opposed to statues, in which colour is of remote consideration, and relief principal. We look at a picture in its frame as if the representation had distance, and were seen through a window or door; the advancement or coming forward of the wall on which it hangs, so long as it does not attract the eye, is therefore a benefit rather than a disadvantage: consequently a plain colour or ground is preferable for hanging pictures upon; hence also frames of the boldest relief and most advancing colour exhibit pictures to the best advantage, by forming as it were a proscenium to the design, for pictures in this respect are dramas.

As to colour, those which are cold and dark are the most retiring; the warm and light advance most; and each colour has its antagonist, and consequently may affect a picture well or ill, according to its tone or general hue hence there can be no universally good colour for the walls of a picture-gallery or painting-room; we may therefore conclude that a mean, or middle colour, not too obtrusive on the eye, is generally preferable; such is a crimson hue, compounded of a retiring and advancing colour, and neither hot nor cold,-which contrasts with the general green of nature and pictures. These are the middle colours of the chromatic system,the most generally agreeable antagonists, and in almost all cases inoffensive to the eye.

We conclude, therefore, that a plain, flat, unobtrusive crimson colour is best adapted to the walls of an exhibition-room, and far superior to any other in general effect; it might also correct the too frequently prison-like appearance of the painting-room, and, if the mass of colour in

this case should prove too advancing upon the eye of the artist, its power may be subdued by breaking it with a faint pattern or design.

Such a crimson will in general afford the most effective contrast to the works of the landscapepainter and subjects exhibiting distance, but is less essential to the portrait and historic painters, whose objects are more immediate and advancing; to such, therefore, a more retiring colour —a modest green, may in some cases prove more eligible; but the practice sometimes resorted to by the artist, of producing a favorable contrast for his pictures by a colour in itself disgusting upon his walls, is to be deprecated, as exciting an ill sentiment on entering the room by no means advantageous to himself or his works. In all cases, therefore, he should select a pleasing tint of colour; and, we may remark, that those of crimson and green are universally so, and that they are prime media of nature and art in effecting chromatic harmony: since however a universal rule cannot be given, the artist will have to exercise his judgment, according to the case, in selecting such hue as is best suited to the general character of his colouring, according to the principle of chromatic equivalence.

Upon this principle a bright fawn colour has been found by far the most favourable for contrasting the grey hue of the print in the hanging of engravings, and the only ground upon which they are viewed to advantage.

A cool gray, or neutral, is in general best suited to the passages and approaches of the gallery as a preparation of the eye, but is too retiring for the exhibition of pictures in general, although it is better suited to the sculpture which commonly ushers the visitor to the gallery or painting-room.

*

It might become a useful accessary to the study of an artist if sliding rods crossed the room diagonally, upon which a number of variously coloured and figured curtains moved beyond his subject or sitter, with which he might suit colours, or form combinations, draperies, &c. as backgrounds, or tune his eye upon feeling and principle to the colouring of his design. The utility and importance of appropriate backgrounds in portraiture, and even as auxiliaries to the rigid academic model, have been rendered so apparent by the precepts and practice of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and they are so efficient in imparting meaning, sentiment, and harmony, to the otherwise inane and monotonous appearance of single figures, that they need hardly be urged in favour of such accessaries to the painting-room. The principle has indeed been acted upon of late years by some of those academicians who have been elected to the honourable distinction of directing the living school of the Royal Academy as visitors, and the practice must have proved eminently conducive to the progress of the student, to whom it supplied the means of fully comprehending the action, and the art of using the figure, while he traced with correctness its form; thus subjecting at once his hand, his eye, and his mind, to the same discipline. The art of seeing nature, or in other words the art of using models,' says Sir Joshua, † is in reality the great object-the point to which all our studies are directed.'

Form, and the simple figure, are, however, principal in sculpture, and in the rigid school of the living figure; nor should any accompaniments be allowed to infringe needlessly upon the time allotted for study, nor to run to the extreme of the minor schools; nor should the practice of the living school be confounded with the tableau vivante of the Continent, which has been refined upon and carried to perfection by Mr. Parris in the school of the Historical Society, wherein

* Sir J. R.'s Works, Note XLII.

In his 12th Discourse.

almost every mode of composition and variety of accompaniment are judiciously introduced in life, light, shade, and colour, under the most beautiful and ingenious arrangements. Yet these several modes of practice have the same efficient principle, under the influence of which the pencil will acquire a fidelity preservative from false and unmeaning combinations, and a habit disposing the hand and eye to taste and effect, constituting a proper foundation for the poetry, expression, and sentiment-which are the offspring of feeling and intelligence, and the highest attainments of the art.

Aders, Mr., his collection of antient pictures, Bice Blue 113

Arrangement of colours 15, 21, 28, 32, 61, 72,85 Blanc de Roi 71