Green Border.

It weakens the browns: it reddens the half-tints, the lights and the whites, but the latter more feebly; the whites, in the green border, are less light than in the white.

As with the yellow, the complementary tint of the border is much more apparent when the daylight is less vivid. The effect of green is agreeable.

Blue Border.

The effect of this border is most definite, and certainly the most remarkable of all those we can obtain by the juxtaposition of a coloured band with a lithograph. The orange shade to which it gives rise, spreading over the landscape, produces the harmony of a dominant colour (179.), and changes the aspect of the lithograph surrounded by white to that of a drawing in bistre or sepia on india-paper. Doubtless the reddish tint of the lithographic ink, combining with the complementary orange arising from the juxtaposition of the blue, produces the remarkable effect of which I speak (70.ter.).

Any one who prefers the effect of sepia upon india-paper to the lithograph upon white paper can change the latter to the former by a simple blue border.

Violet Border.

The browns near the border lose much of their tone; the half-tints are greener; the whites and the lights are yellower than in the white border.

(572.) To conclude; the rule to be followed in assorting a frame to a picture is, that its colour, brightness, and ornaments also, shall injure neither the colours nor the shadows, nor the lights of the picture, nor the ornaments represented in it.

When we proceed to interpose a border between the frame and an engraving plain or coloured, we must take into consideration

1o. The effect of the height of tone of this border upon the different tones of the design;

2o. The effect of the complementary of the colour of the border upon the colour of the design;

3°. The intensity of the diffused light which is considered most suitable to light the design. Because for a given border the mutual relations between the browns, the half-tints, the lights, and the whites, change with the intensity of the daylight, and change more for a given composition with certain borders than with others.

A composition of small or medium size may be painted in such manner that the artist will be obliged beforehand to choose the frame for himself and to paint up those parts of his picture which are contiguous, but in such a way that they shall harmonise with it.

CHAPTER III.

ON THE GENERAL DECORATION OF THE INTERIORS OF CHURCHES.

(573.) In the preceding section I have treated of the employment of colours in architecture under a general point of view, and I have only incidentally enounced my individual opinion upon the colour employed in the interior decoration of gothic churches, having been led irresistibly to speak of this by the continuous harmony which the stained-glass windows establish, as much as is possible between the exterior and interior decoration. I now return to the subject, no longer to treat of it relatively to a given architectonic form, but to consider it under a general point of view.

Conformably to the principle enounced above (370.), of judging the productions of art by the rules drawn from the nature of the materials employed, I establish two distinct classes of churches, not according to their form, but to a fundamental consideration which subordinates the interior decoration to the quality of the light, coloured or colourless, diffused through plain or coloured glass.

A. Churches with Stained Glass Windows.

(574.) From the bad effect of the mutual proximity of white and stained glass (434.), it results that where one is employed in a church the other must be excluded, at least in the nave, choir,-in a word, in all that the spectator can embrace at one point of view, for the colourless glass in some of the chapels of the aisles is of no consequence in the general effect.

(575.) As I have said (553.), if we must have pictures near stained windows, they should be flat, or present subjects as simple as possible, since their effects are entirely sacrificed to those of the stained glass.

(576.) Strictly speaking, we can place pictures in a large church where the light is transmitted through coloured glass; but for the view to be satisfactory, they must necessarily encounter such a union of conditions, that it is a well-founded assertion to say that they will almost always be found out of place, or, what is the same thing, will not occupy a position to be appreciated as if they were placed elsewhere. In fact, if the pictures are not at a certain distance from the glass; if the coloured lights which emanate from them are not, by their mutual admixture, in the requisite proportions for producing white light, or, at least, a very faintly coloured light; finally, if this white or very feebly coloured light be insufficient to lighten the interior of the church properly, as would be in the case of the diffused light transmitted through white glass, the pictures will lose their colour, unless they have been executed with reference to the nature of the light transmitted in a given place by the stained windows; but this case is, to my knowledge, never realised. It is, then, in consequence of the preceding conditions not being met, that in treating of the windows of gothic churches (436.), I have only spoken of tapestries, and not of the pictures which may be found on their walls.

B. Churches with White Glass Windows.

(577.) Churches with white glass windows harmonise with every ornament we can imagine in the employment of wood, marbles, porphyry, granite, and the metals. Mosaics may

ornament the floors and adorn the walls with true pictures, as we see in St. Peter's, at Rome; painting in fresco, in oil, plain and coloured sculptures, also combine to ornament the interior.

(578.) In churches of this class, the profusion of riches at the disposal of the decorator, far from being always of advantage to him, is sometimes the cause of difficulties, because the more varied the objects he has to arrange, the easier it becomes for him to depart from the object which it would be necessary to attain, so as to present such objects only as are in keeping with the place he wishes to embellish. It is not enough to have precious woods, marbles, metals, pictures, he must also make these objects harmonise in such a way that the extent of their respective surfaces be in proper proportions, and also pass from one to another without confusion to the contiguous limits; and yet without shocking cultivated

tastes.

Thus, he must avoid putting coloured marbles contiguous to the white stone of which the walls are constructed; he must also avoid surrounding bas-reliefs in white stone with slabs or borders of red or green marble.

(579.) The Cathedral of Cologne for churches with coloured glass, and St. Peter's at Rome for those with white glass, are two types which it will be sufficient to mention, when we wish to demonstrate that beauty is compatible with different systems. Which of these types is to be preferred to the other? This is one of those questions which I consider it idle to attempt to solve absolutely, if we accord our admiration to the one on condition of proscribing the other. But if we study it with the intention of examining why either is to be admired, we shall arrive at some satisfactory conclusion upon these works of art.

(580.) In setting out with the principle of the fitness of these edifices to their purpose, I have admitted that the gothic church, with its architectonic ornaments and stained glass, leaves nothing to be desired on the score of religious sentiment, so admirably adapted is the interior illumination to meditation, so well have the objects we find there been chosen, that, far from distracting the attention by worldly

images, they have been well selected for exciting a pious ardour to raise our prayers to heaven.

(581.) Although admiring the marvels which the arts have accumulated in churches where white light freely enters, and although I acknowledge the effects which certain pictures of the first class are capable of producing on the Christian mind, yet I cannot omit remarking, that the churches where we see these decorations resemble museums of art more than temples consecrated to prayer, and that under this aspect they do not appear to me to fulfil in the same degree the conditions imposed by the principle of fitness of edifices to their purpose as gothic churches with stained glass windows.

CHAPTER IV.

ON THE DECORATION OF MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES.

(582.) WE give the name of museum to those edifices intended to contain products of art, such as statues, pictures, medals, &c., and natural productions, such as minerals, stuffed animals, &c.

(583.) The essential condition which these edifices must fulfil, is, that the light be as white and as vivid as possible; but always diffused, and distributed equally and in the most suitable manner upon all the objects exhibited to the spectator, so that they may be viewed without fatigue, and seen distinctly in every part.

ARTICLE 1.

Pinacotheca, or Picture Galleries.

(584.) In picture galleries there is generally a disposition to prodigality of ornaments and gilding; without pretending that they should be absolutely proscribed as decoration, yet I believe that there is less inconvenience in sinning by omission than by commission; in fact, the pictures are the valuable objects, and it is upon them that we must endea