Other instruments required are, com passes for ascertaining distances between lines, forming circles, taking measure ments by ?tale, &c. &c. ; a steel pen, for diawing very fine clear lines ; a parallel ruler, formed of two pieces of hard black wood fastened together by brass bands, turning on pivots at the extremities so exactly, that, when opened, lines drawn along the outward half must be parallel with the half held firm on the paper ; and a T ruler or square so contrived as to su persede the above on the drawing board, by applying the stock or shortest end to the edge of the board, where it is slid backwards or forwards, and the long part used for tracing the line.
The materials for drawing are, black lead cut into long pieces, and inclosed in red cedar ; the greatest care should be taken in the choice of black-lead pencils, as the inferior are nothing more than frag ments of this mineral united by glue, which cannot be brought to a point by a knife, or made to produce a line for a minute together; ors the contrary, the ge nuine black-lead cuts with ease, and yet has so much solidity, that considerable pressure will not break a taper point.
Indian-rubber, which is used for cleans ing off erroneous lines made by the black lead pencil ; this singular substance, im ported principally from south America in the shape of small bottles, and the East In dies in other forms, is composed of the gum of a tree, which, in hardening, be comes elastic, and possesses a strong ad hesive property, extremely useful for re moving dirt from drawings and prints.
Indian-ink is another valuable material, brought from China, where the secret of making it still remains ; the real import ed ink bears certain Chinese characters, breaks smooth and shining, is not gritty, and when used appears of a clear brown ish black. The English imitation may be known by the harshness of its competent parts.
Hair-pencils. The Chinese, who use the Indian-ink for writing, with a brush, make them very excellent for drawing, with white hair drawn through a reed; but those are difficult to procure, and camel's hair inserted in various sized quills are substituted, which are tried by slightly wetting them ; if they form a point without separating, they are fit for use.
Chalks. It is common to sketch the outlines of figures with charcoal made from the willow, previous to the use of the chalk, as whatever errors may be committed with this material are easily effaced by the feathers from the wing of a duck or goose.
White chalk, for drawing; is harder than the common chalk, and pipe clay will make a good substitute.
Black chalk, is a hard fossil substance, cut into the shape of slate pencils, and used in steel or brass port-crayons, and with the white is constantly preferred in the model room of the Royal Academy, the professors of which consider it the best material for drawing from plaster figures or the life ; red chalk is but little used at present. The French chalk is softer than the Italian.
Stumps made of soft leather, or paper rolled into cylinders, and pointed, are' necessary for blending the lights and shades.
Thus prepared, the student must con fine himself to the copying of single sub jects, and by no means attempt groupes of objects, as the eye, more rapid than thought, will wander over them, and confound his ideas, not yet taught the faculty of discrimination ; to attain this ti faculty, it is absolutely necessary to vance progressively, commencing with ) the geometrical figures of arches, cir des, ovals, cones, cylinders, and squares, which, except the latter, have an evident resemblance to many of the forms of na ture, and accurately attain the shading , which produces their rotundity, convexi-.
ty, angles, and most remote parts from the eye. Grapes detached from, or ad hering in clusters to, the stalk, and many other fruits with their leaves, furnish ex cellent hints for the acquiring of graceful turns, and the art of placing justly, strong, direct, and reflected lights. Those quire no rules or directions whatever, even in the colouring, as the tints may be composed from the originals. Trees should also be drawn singly, carefully ob serving the nature of the bark, the cha racteristics of the trunk, the particular ramifications of the branches, the form of the leaves, and their appearance in the aggregate, so that an observer shall, upon the first inspection of the drawing, pronounce whether it is an oak, an elm, an ash, or a poplar.
Animals may be the next object of the learner's attention, a knowledge of the , forms of which will be best obtained by , examining the most approved drawings and prints, copying them, and comparing them with living subjects, carefully avoid ing in future such errors as may be dis covered; he may then proceed to the , human figure, commencing his labours with drawing the eye. mouth, nose, feet, hands, &c. separately, till he is perfect, when the whole figure may be attempt ed. The copying of i nanimate substances requires but few directions, as they lay fixed, and may be placed in any position but it is far otherwise in drawing from animals or man, for which reason an ac curate knowledge of the true shape of the bones, the disposition of the mus cles, and the exact relative proportions of the different parts of the body, must absolutely be acquired ; nor is this all that is necessary ; motion continually va rying the appearance of the muscles, the student must learn from living subjects every swell or depression in them, which is not the consequence of unnatural dis tortion : as there are certain limits to their motion, he should be capable of as certaining those limits correctly from re tnembrance. It having pleased the divi nity to grant the human race the most graceful variety of curved forms through out the exterior of their frames, and each being subject to sudden and unexpected changes, we may safely assert the artist has a most difficult task in his attempts to delineate them; in order to do so suc cessfully, it would be well for him to imi tate the parts already mentioned from good drawings, with black lead, or black chalk, on either of the papers before re commended, endeavouring to give a close resemblance of the outlines with char coal, and then shading with the greatest care, after the original, in parallel lines of greater or less strength, according with the curve to be expressed, those to be intersected by others forming lozenge intervals ; this mechanical part of the art of shading will be better explained by the drawing copied from, than by any di rections, and much trouble will be saved by using the middle tint paper ; but it should he remembered, that though black chalk can be used upon white pa per, black lead must be confined to it. The shadows are sometimes softened off by the stump, yet clear hatched lines in the form above-mentioned have a better effect, not that we would recommend the servile resemblance of an engraiing, imi tations of this description never failing to injure the freedom of hand, essential in drawing well.