It is well, however, to test our powers by simple problems at first. If we cannot combine a great variety of attractive forms harmoniously, and fit them to useful purpose, let us try what we can do with few and simple forms. If we fail at constructing gates of Paradise let us see if we cannot make a good railing. If we cannot invent a romantic knocker, let us try our hands at an effective scraper. It is much better to do a simple thing well, than a complex or ambitious thing badly; and there is far more need in the world for well-designed and beautiful common things than for elaborate exceptional things.

A study of iron-work should be useful to all students in design, as showing what ornamental effects can be gained by economy of means, the effectiveness of simply repeating well-chosen curves, spirals, and lines; as well as the amount of fantasy and feeling which an inventive designer and craftsman can put into such work in its more complex and elaborate forms, and, above all, how perfectly it may be made to unite serviceableness and beauty; while, perhaps more conspicuously than most kinds of artistic work, it illustrates the essential unity of material and method with their results in design.

The illustrations given exemplify different varieties of treatment, and also show how design in iron-work, in addition to the influence of the material, is controlled by the spirit and period of the architecture of which it becomes part.

We see this in comparing the free Gothic and rather fantastic forms of the gates of the south porch of S. Laurence at Nuremberg with the symmetric and formal screen from S. Thomas's, Salisbury (seventeenth or eighteenth century), or both with the flowing Renascence scroll balustrade from Rothenburg.

A most important branch of design is that of textiles, whether we regard it in its close association with daily life and the wants of humanity, with domestic comfort, personal adornment, or ecclesiastical splendour. It is, perhaps, the most intimate of the arts of design, and here again we shall find the control of material and method always asserting themselves.

Textile designing may be broadly divided into two main kinds: (1) that which is an incorporated part of the textile itself, as in woven patterns, carpets, and tapestry; and (2) that which is designed as a surface decoration to be printed or worked on the textile, as in cotton, cloth, cretonne, silk, velvet, and embroidery.

Into the many technicalities and complexities of the modern power-loom it is not now necessary to enter; but the main essential conditions it is always necessary for the textile designer to have in mind are that his design has to be produced by the crossing of threads in the loom, by warp and weft, as the sets of threads are called—the warp being the vertical threads, forming the web and foundation of the fabric; the woof or weft being the horizontal thread woven through it at right angles.

In the simple low warp hand-loom, the warp being in two sets, the alternate threads are lifted by the heddles alternately. These heddles are connected with treadles worked by the feet of the weaver, who, with his hand, passes his shuttle with the woof backwards and forwards through the interstices thus left, and weaves the plain cloth. To make patterns, various wefts in different colours are added. This is the fundamental simple principle of weaving, which in a still simpler form may be seen in the making of tapestry and carpets in the high warp loom, where the threads of the warp are stretched vertically upon rollers in a framework, at which the worker sits and works in by his hands the different colours of the pattern horizontally, twisting and knotting the threads in through the warps on which the pattern has been marked, and pressing it together by a sort of comb to make it firm and solid; as the fabric is completed it is rolled up upon the roller.

Penelope is seen working at such a loom in a Greek vase painting. The simple hand-loom, as it was in the seventeenth century, is seen in the figure taken from Erasmus's "Praise of Folly."

What chiefly concerns the designer in woven textiles, therefore, is that he must be prepared for the necessity that his design must adapt itself to working out upon a square trellis of horizontal and vertical lines, which will represent his outlines, or the edges of his masses, in stepped outlines and edges, where the design crosses the warp diagonally at any angle, and in straight lines where it runs with the warp; since it may be said that pattern on woven cloth is produced by leaving out, or stopping out, certain threads in the wefts, disclosing one set in one place and another in another; such threads corresponding with the holes cut in the cards placed in the loom to regulate the pattern, which are prepared from the design, after it has been worked out on squared paper to calculated intervals and numbers of threads or points to each line and mass of the pattern.

Now, so far from wishing to conceal the characteristic flatness and squareness of outline and mass, which the nature of the conditions of weaving normally produce, the artist values these characteristics as essential to the work, and would make his design adaptable to them.

The most beautiful and decorative effects are produced in woven textiles by the contrast, harmony, and blending of coloured threads, wool, or silk, and the relief of one flat colour upon another, or one flat tint upon another shade of the same tint, so that anything like attempts at naturalistic drawing, and the representation of planes of light and shade and relief can only be clumsy, owing to the nature of the conditions, besides being mistaken, from the point of view of good pattern-work.

There are no better masters in the selection and treatment of natural forms in textile design than the Persians, who, in their magnificent carpets, show both the extreme of graceful conventional pattern, and also a happy mean in the treatment of flowers, trees, and animals, exhibiting in their drawing and colour definite characterization rather than naturalism; translating nature, as it were, and allying it with invention in a distinct region of their own. To do this is really what all designers should aim at, in whatsoever material they may work.

When we come to the second division of textile design, that in which pattern is applied to the surface of the cloth after it has been woven, by means of printing, the designer is chiefly controlled by considerations of scale and beauty of effect, as he has to adapt his design to various purposes, such as hangings and furniture coverings, or small dress patterns, kerchiefs, and so forth. Beyond the necessary limit of size of repeat and its satisfactory construction, he is freer than in designing for woven textiles; and, in fact, has about as much range as any other surface designer in colours.

It is considered a practical and economic advantage that a design should adapt itself to printing in many different schemes of colour, and be capable of treatment on a light or dark ground. In larger scale patterns, such as furniture cretonnes, patterns or parts of patterns are produced by a mordant or resist; that is to say, the light parts are printed in a mordant or chemical preparation which takes out the dye, and so discloses in those parts the natural colour of the cotton cloth. Similar effects can be produced by the reverse method of printing the cloth first with a resist and dyeing or printing the whole afterwards.

The methods and machinery of printing cotton have been carried to great perfection, and the necessary limitations as to what effects can or cannot be obtained are very few, what is done being largely regulated by considerations of cost. These apparent advantages, however, from the artistic point of view, expose us to new dangers. We may easily lose sight of the end in the very perfection of the means; the very facility of those means may lead the designer to forget that, after all, he is designing for a textile—something which will be hung in folds, variously draped, or worn. The desire to show the capacity of the method of printing a pattern in colours may not always be on all fours with the wish for tasteful design and reposeful effect. The fierce competition of trade, and the violent demands of the salesman, do not harmonize with the judgment of the artist. If you were in a company where all were talking at once at the top of their voices you would have to shout very loudly if you wanted to be heard, but no one would contend that these were the best conditions for the human voice. It is, however, a tolerably just simile of the present conditions of trade and their effect upon design. So long as things are made primarily to sell, rather than to last and live with, there will always be this difficulty and disparity between art and commerce; but a school of art can only concern itself with what are the best methods, and endeavour always to set up the best types of design, the best standards of taste.

If we want to represent flowers, for instance, in their natural superficial aspects of light and shade and relief, the natural form for such renderings is the still life study; the natural means, the canvas, palette, and brushes, or Whatman and water-colour; the natural equipment, power of graphic drawing and knowledge of pictorial effect. But, whatever value, pictorial interest, and charm such studies may have, as such, with the charm of treatment, with the freedom of handling open to the pictorial artist, and with the direct personal touch, the value, pictorial interest, and charm and beauty would be entirely lost if they were done by the yard, and spread over acres of cotton. The particular conditions which give value to the individual pictorial study become utterly lost when the attempt is made to produce a pattern on the same principles. It is neither good pattern nor good painting; and the very best machine-painting can only give a more or less coarse rendering of hand-painting, and it is therefore a mistaken application of it to try. It requires no special artistic feeling or training to recognize a bunch of roses or poppies thrown in exaggerated relief on a flat surface; but it does require both to appreciate a design made of the same flowers, composed and coloured harmoniously in an ingenious repeat, and drawn firmly and delicately with an understanding of the character and construction of the plants, yet treated with fancy and invention, and, at the same time, meeting perfectly the nature of the material and the method of manufacture. These qualities I should enumerate as the real necessities in designing for printed fabrics, whether it is cotton cloth printed from the pattern engraved on copper rollers, or furniture cretonne printed from flat blocks. In either case, in providing the design, firmness and sharpness of line would be good, and precision of touch in laying in the colour.

The embroiderer, again, is comparatively free as to range of choice in treatment of surface design, which will be necessarily governed by purpose, position, and nature of material and method employed. The bold design and large scale detail which would be suitable for bed hangings and curtains in crewel work, such as we find in the Queen Anne period, would be obviously out of place in small panels of delicate fine silk-work. A greater approach to the colours and surfaces of nature, too, in silk-work may be attempted, as in the plumage of birds and the petals of flowers, as we see in Chinese and Japanese silk embroideries, though the decorative principle of shading one colour with other tints of the same should be followed when shading is used, keeping the colour pure and brilliant, and never using black or brown for shadows on colours.

A certain natural convention, we might say, belongs to the conditions of material and method in embroidery, and is inseparable from the art of the expression of form by stitches. Following the same principle of such acknowledgment of necessary limitations which we find hold good in other decorative arts, the essential stitch method of the embroiderer should be rather emphasized than concealed, although it does not follow that in preparing designs to be embroidered the stitches need be all represented, so long as the design is clear and plain, and the outlines distinct; while in the choice of the direction of the stitches, as well as in their form and character, must be found the particular means of expressing varieties of surface and characteristics of form. In making leaves, for instance, one would naturally make the stitches radiate from the centre towards the point, while the character of tree stems is well expressed by carrying the stitches crossways over others laid vertically first, as, in addition to the suggestion of lines of bark, the double row of stitches has the effect of suggesting the projection of a rounded stem. For filling in large masses, or for meandering types of patterns and scroll-work, or bold outline, chain-stitch is very useful, and has a compact, solid effect. It is much used in Indian embroideries. The introduction of gold thread, so much found in all oriental embroidery, enriches and heightens the effects of the colours very much, and on the unbleached linens and muslins, where the pattern is quite light, it has a charming effect. The Japanese make very effective use of gold thread embroidery, in some cases carrying the whole of the work out in gold upon a dark ground, or using it as a partial enrichment on printed textiles such as kimonos or robes; in other kinds, notably in dark, rich, full-coloured embroidered hangings, by introducing disks of gold thread, formed by stitching the thread down upon the ground in closely twisted spiral forms, which catch the light very effectively when hung upon the wall.

There is, indeed, in the embroiderer's art immense range of both treatment and subject. It may be light and delicate, and restricted to one or two colours, or vie in fulness, richness, and depth of colour and splendour of effect with tapestry itself. It may adorn a child's quilt, or decorate an altar; it may touch the hem of a garment, or inform the cover of a book; nothing seems to be above or below it; and throughout its manifold adaptations it offers an attractive field to the designer and the worker who is not afraid of patient but not unrewarding labour.

As further exemplifying the influence of material and method, I may just touch upon another art, in our days the most popular and far-reaching, perhaps, of all—the art of design in black and white for the book and the newspaper.

Now, the early woodcut as we find it in the printed books of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries owed its forms and qualities to the necessities of surface printing with types in a hand-press. The vigorous, bold drawing with the pen on the wood-block was cut by the engraver with a knife and on the plank, not as now, upon the cross section of the box tree: softer wood, too, was at first probably used. The engraver's knife left the artist's line firmer, perhaps, than it was drawn, and the design in vigorous open line was exactly adapted to print under the same pressure as the type had to undergo. The two were in true mechanical relation, and also in true artistic relation. The decorative effect of the early printers' pages is remarkably fine, and is obtained by very simple means.

With the decline of the severe and vigorous drawing of the great designers of the late Gothic and early Renascence period, and probably also with the invention of copper-plate engraving and printing, and the more rapid production of books, the art of the book printer declined, and the art of the book decorator with it; and although the woodcut still held its place, and was largely used for the next two centuries, and, indeed, down to our own time, in book ornaments, initial letters, and illustrations, it had fallen into inferior hands.

At the end of last century a sort of revival took place under Thomas Bewick and his school, which led, not to a revival of the firm and open linear drawing of the designers of the early printers, but rather to a search after extra fineness and qualities of tone and colour, hitherto associated with steel or copper-plate. This tendency or aim of the engravers, however, only served to put the woodcut out of relation with the type, and the type itself grew uglier, and was hardly considered as part of the artistic character of the book. William Blake seems to have been the only artist who made any attempt to consider the necessary relation of illustration and type, but he did it by means of copper-plate, and writing his own lettering.

It is only recently that a serious effort has been made to re-establish the old relationship between design and text in surface printing and as applied to books. Our newspapers and illustrated journals still print heavy black blocks, reproduced from wash drawings, along with thin pale type; and the tendency of the recent new photographic processes of reproducing the designs of artists has rather been to dislocate the decorative feeling and the relationship of type and picture aforesaid, by imposing no restrictions of material or method in preparing drawings for the press. We have now, however, a school of printers and designers in black and white who do consider decorative effect in printing and in the design of the printed page.

Mr. William Morris, by his personal experiment and practice of printing, approaching it from the designer's point of view, has again placed the printing of books in the position of an art. By practical demonstration in the beautiful results of his work—in the beautiful books he issued from the Kelmscott Press—he has shown us what very fine decorative effects can be got by careful consideration of the form of the letters, by the placing of the type upon the page, by the use of good handmade paper, by the use of ornaments and initial letters of rich and bold design, harmonizing with the strength and richness of the type (which makes the ordinary types look pale and thin). His work, too, is obviously influencing printers and publishers generally, so that something like a renascence in printing and in design and decoration in black and white has been going on during the last few years.

Certainly a return to the practice of drawing in line is good, not only as a test of design and draughtsmanship, and absolutely necessary to all designers, but also as essential to designs or illustrations intended to contribute to the decorative character of the printed page.

In the various instances, therefore, to which I have drawn attention, we have seen that design in its many forms and applications must be reconciled to certain limitations of material and method; but that, so far from these limitations being a hindrance to harmonious expression or to beauty of result, they themselves, by their very nature, if properly understood and frankly acknowledged, lead to those very results of beauty and harmonious expression which come of that perfect unity of design, material, and method it is the object of all decorative art to attain.

CHAPTER IV.—ON THE INFLUENCE OF CONDITIONS IN DESIGN

IN the previous three chapters we have been considering Design under various conditions of use and material. The present may be considered as a continuation of the same line of thought in somewhat different directions.

We may consider conditions in the general sense as those general æsthetic laws governing the place and purpose of designs, and their position in relation to the eye and hand, such as height, plane of extension, and scale; or in the more particular sense which includes all these, as well as more strict technical conditions which, being accepted by the artistic faculty, influence the form and character of all design, the object being, of course, the attainment of the greatest beauty consistent with such conditions.

All design is necessarily conditioned, from the purely graphic and pictorial to the most abstract forms of decoration. We cannot set pencil to paper even without committing ourselves to a kind of compact with conditions. Here is a white expanse—a plain surface; here is something to make black marks with.

The artistic realization of or presentment of our thought, or our rendering of a piece of nature or of art will depend upon our frank acceptance of the natural limits of the capacity of pencil and paper—of plane, surface, line, and tint as conditions of representation, and on our faithfulness to them, by means of which we shall attain the most truth and beauty in drawing.

It is the recognition of this which gives distinction to all drawing, according to the individuality, invention, and character of the artist. We recognize his style and personality by his manner of dealing with the conditions of the work, and nowhere does this come out more emphatically than when those conditions are reduced to the simplest. So that in a line drawing in pen or pencil, in the economy of the means, and in the skill and mastery by which facts of nature, character, life, action, or beauty of line and ornamental effect are rendered by the simple use of outline, or tint, or solid black, we can recognise the artist of power just as clearly as we recognize a friend's handwriting.

The suavity and grace of Raphael, the energy of Michael Angelo, the learning and finish of Leonardo, the sculptor-like definition of Mantegna, the firmness and care of Dürer, the breadth and richness of Holbein; all these qualities come out clearly enough in the studies and drawings of these masters in pen, pencil, and chalk. For beauty of style, treatment, and decorative feeling in pencil and chalk, perhaps few come near the studies of our modern master, Burne-Jones.

In making studies, too, another condition comes in, important enough in its effects—that of time. In general practice no means to ends are more useful than rapid sketches and notes of passing actions and transient effects. In order to seize the essential facts quickly great economy of means is necessary, and practice and experience alone can teach us facility in selecting the leading points and most expressive lines. Given a limited time in which to note facts, the problem is how to set down the most truth in the simplest and most forcible way.

The conditions which govern the making of a sketch or study upon paper are sufficient as tests of artistic capacity, of draughtsmanship, of taste, and the other fine qualities which go to the making of a work of art, having what may be termed an independent or individual interest and value; but in adapting any kind of design to a definite ornamental purpose other conditions immediately come into play over and above those belonging to the conditions of draughtsmanship alone, conditions which at once influence the style of draughtsmanship and determine the treatment.

Again, everyone who attempts designs for different kinds of decorative purpose, for different materials, for different planes of extension, for different positions and uses, must perceive that such considerations are important factors in determining the plan, construction, and spirit of the design.

The ornamental conditions, for instance, which govern the design of wall-papers and hangings, demand patterns which climb upwards and spread laterally without any apparent effect or flaw in the repeat. Frieze designs, again, demand horizontal extension and definite rhythm, which latter is an important element in all border design.

Designs for extension upon floors and pavements, where the effect of perspective distorts forms as they recede from the eye, require their own special planning and treatment, square, circular, diamond, and fish-scale plans being generally the safest, as bases, since they preserve their form in perspective better than irregular non-geometric or more complex plans.

Much the same kind of considerations control ceiling decoration, where, in addition, suggestions may be taken from constructive conditions, as, in flat ceilings, the design following parallel beams and joists and their interstices; the panelled arrangement of a coffered ceiling; or radiating spring of lines from constructive centres, as in vaulted ceilings.

Where a pattern will be broken by deep folds, as in textiles, in hangings, and curtains, the conditions favour the recurrence of bold masses, richer points, and more strongly defined forms, at intervals, than would be agreeable in a pattern for extension on a plane surface, unless we except carpets, where boldness of form and richness of colour are desirable.

Such conditions as these influence every department of decorative design, and in proportion to the completeness with which they are satisfied will depend the success of designs; and a design which may have less actual beauty, perhaps, than another, but which completely fulfils the conditions of its existence, is likely to have a longer life.

The persistence of certain well-known types of pattern is probably due to this—such as the continual reappearance of the Greek fret in various forms as a border design in all sorts of work.

Questions of scale in design are less absolute, perhaps, since, though one may say as a rule that large types of design and detail belong to large rooms and large scale buildings, there may be interesting exceptions, when large patterns might suit even in a small room, if a particular artistic effect were sought.

The main condition in the matter of scale appears to be that we cannot afford to ignore the average human standard. As we may say that the human frame itself contains the elements and principles of all ornamental design, so its proportions and scale control the proportions and scale of all design. Objects intended for human use and service are bound to be of certain fixed or average sizes—seats and couches about eighteen inches from the ground, for instance; ordinary domestic doors not much over six feet high, and three feet six inches or four feet wide. The size of casements, again, is strictly related to the power of the hand to open them; while the sizes of all movable objects of use are in like manner strictly governed by the average size, height, and strength of mankind.

Pursuing the influence of such conditions, we find that there are in every direction natural limitations in every department of design: in the first place of scale and position in relation to eye and hand, in the second place of method and material.

Take the page of a printed book, for instance. The body of type impressed upon the paper, gives the proportions and dimensions of the page. The double page, when the book is opened to show the right and left hand pages (or recto and verso, as they are termed), is the true unit, not the single page.

The type should be placed so as to leave the narrowest margin at the top and the inside, the broader on the outside, and the broadest of all at the foot. And this for obvious reasons, since in holding a book in our hand we naturally want the type brought well under the eye, the pages being set as close together as the necessities of joining down the middle will allow conveniently, so that the eye need not have to jump across a large brook of margin in travelling from one to the other, while the deep margin below enables the book to be held in the hand well set up before the eye, without touching the type.

In taking up a book with the intention of decorating or illustrating it, we must accept frankly these conditions, which indeed are, properly considered, a substantial help to the artist, just as the necessities of the ground plan give suggestions for the elevation in architectural design. These conditions, we may take it, are the architectural conditions of book-page construction.

The size, then, of our page-panel being fixed, as well as the page of type necessary to the book (sizes of books are, of course, determined by folding of the paper—folio, quarto, octavo, duodecimo, and so on), we are free to deal with it decoratively in a variety of ways, subject only to the acknowledgment of the essential condition that it is a book-page, and not a random sheet of paper to make blots of ink upon—or a stereoscope, or a card-basket, for instance, as some modern treatments of illustration in books suggest.

We may use the whole page for the design, surrounding it with a line or border. Or for the sake of richer and more ornate effect, while confining our picture or illustration to the limits of the type-page, we may use our margin for a decorative framework or border. As also in using ornamental initial letters the side borders can be utilized for ornaments branching up and down from the letter to emphasize the chapter or paragraph, in the manner of mediæval illuminated MSS., and in the way adopted by William Morris in his Kelmscott Press books.

Or, again, limiting our decoration to the actual type-page, we may divide the page at the opening of a chapter by a frieze-shaped panel or heading across the top, placing the initial letter below; or insert a picture in the text, occupying a half-page or quarter-page; or at the ending of a chapter design a tailpiece to fill the page where the type ends, treating any space within the limits of the type-page, which the type does not occupy, as a field for design, or placing one's pictures and ornaments in the midst or in place of the type.

The title-page, again, is capable of an immense variety of treatment, and great ornamental use can always be made of the lettering, whether accompanied by design or not.

I think, too, that it is obvious that the conditions of surface printing point to line-drawing as the most harmonious in effect for book illustration and decoration, as well as most practical mechanically, since type and blocks which decorate a page must be subjected to the same pressure. The form of letters, too, in movable type, being linear, whether Gothic or Roman letters, line-drawing is in direct decorative relation with the type.

In proportion to the solidity or heaviness of the letters, too, as a general principle, stronger effects of black and white may be ventured on, while if the type is light and elegant, finer and more open-like work would be the most harmonious treatment. With the use of handmade paper, again, upon which a printed book always looks best, openness of line is a necessary condition in design work to be reproduced as surface printing blocks with the type, since the quality of the paper requires considerable pressure to bring up bright impressions, and under such pressure (with the grain and rough surface of the paper, which gives the richness to the lines and blocks of type or woodcut) fine and broken lines would print up too strong, and not look well. Pen or brush drawing, therefore, in firm and unbroken lines is the most adapted to the conditions in this case because they work and look the best, and lead to a distinct character and style.

Nothing looks worse, to my mind, than heavy toned and realistically treated wash drawings used with a thin and light type, such as we constantly see in newspapers and magazines.

The facility of the photographic processes for reproducing drawings of all kinds (as well as the decline of printing as an art before that, and the decline of good facsimile engraving), have no doubt tended to destroy the sense of style and harmony in combining text and illustration, since the two have come to be considered so entirely apart; but of late years there have been many indications of a return to sounder taste, which is sure to influence the printer's and illustrator's art more and more widely.

From books let us turn for further illustration to another source of illumination, namely, windows; where, in the design of leaded and stained glass, we shall find examples of another strictly conditioned and very beautiful province of design.

In the course of its historical development stained glass seems to show much the same or corresponding general characteristics at different periods as to style, as may be traced in other branches of art. The windows of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries were characterized by geometric pattern, and made up of small pieces of glass, the figure subjects small, set in geometric inclosures or quatrefoil panels and showing Byzantine influence in their treatment.5 It may be, too, that the windows of the early Gothic period were influenced by the rich mosaic work of the Byzantine artists, but in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, as windows became larger and more important features in architecture, and stone tracery enabled very large openings to be filled with coloured and leaded glass, both the figures and the pieces of glass became larger, the general design more pictorial, till in the early sixteenth century we get perspectives and heavily-shaded figures, and large masses of light and dark, until the art perished in eighteenth century transparencies.

It perished because the essential fundamental conditions were ignored or not made important decorative use of. Leading, instead of being regarded as the backbone of the design, its fundamental anatomy, and essential decorative as well as mechanical characteristic, was rather looked upon as an awkward if necessary interruption in the picture, and the glass-painter, in endeavouring to follow the painter on canvas in his effects of relief and chiaroscuro, lost all the peculiar beauty and character of his own art without gaining the distinction of the one he would fain have rivalled.6

It has only been by artists going back to the fundamental conditions, and keeping faith with them, that a revival of glass-painting has taken place in our time.

Now we might divide design in glass into two parts:

Both demand the full light of the sky to do them justice, but especially the colour work, and therefore can only effectively be used for windows placed high, or above the level of the eye, in the wall like church windows, for it is only the full strength of light which brings out the full beauty and depth which the best work in glass always possesses; and in some qualities of glass, indeed, only full sunlight will discover their inner heart of jewel-like colour.

Very beautiful effects in window glazing are produced by patterns formed of plain leads, and their value has of late been perceived by architects, who largely use them in domestic work. Either seen from within or without the effect is pleasant, and suggests a sense both of comfort and romance which refuse to be associated with large blank squares of plate glass and heavy sash windows, which require a Samson or a Sandow to lift.

Inside, the effect of large panes of plate glass is cold. Outside, it forms great holes in the architecture, but, with the use of leads, if the opening is large, there need be scarcely any diminution of light inside, while the network of lead forms a pleasant relief to the window surface and unites it by pattern with the architecture of the building.

The pliant grooved strip of lead, then, is the glass designer's outline. With it he weaves his plain pattern, which he can enrich with spots of colour or by jewels of light in escutcheons and roundels; and when he comes to planning an elaborate figure panel he is bound to contrive a well-constructed basis of leading to hold his colour and form together, and by means of its bold black bounding lines to define the masses of his pattern, each different tint of glass being inclosed by a lead line, and shading, faces, hands, and small details being added with brush drawing in brown upon the coloured glass.