r in his
"Geometrica" gives methods on which to draw the Roman capitals, and also
the black letters, building the former upon the square and its
proportions, the thickness of the down strokes being one-eighth of
square, the thin strokes being one-sixteenth, and the serifs being
turned by circles of one-fourth and one-eighth diameter. The capital O,
it will be noted, is formed of two circles struck diagonally.

[Methods of Drawing in Line]

Letters may be taken as the simplest form of definition by means of
line. They have been reduced through centuries of use from their
primitive hieroglyphic forms to their present arbitrary and fixed types,
though even these fixed types are subject to the variation produced by
changes of taste and fancy.

But when we come to unformulated nature--to the vast world of complex
forms, ever changing their aspect, full of life and movement, trees,
flowers, woods and waters, birds, beasts, fishes, the human form--the
problem how to represent any of these forms, to express and characterize
them by means of so abstract a method as line-drawing, seems at first
difficult enough.

But since the growth of perception, like the power of graphic
representation, is gradual and partial, though progressive, the eye and
the mind are generally first impressed with the salient features and
leading characteristics of natural forms, just as the child's first idea
of a human form is that of a body with four straight limbs, with a
preponderating head. That is the first impression, and it is
unhesitatingly recorded in infantine outline.

The first aim, then, in drawing anything in line is to grasp the general
truths of form, character, and expression.

[The Progressive Method]

There are various methods of proceeding in getting an outline of any
object or figure. To begin with, the student might begin progressively
defining the form by a series of stages in this way. Take the profile
of a bird, for instance; the form might be gradually built up by the
combination of a series of lines:

[Illustration (f006a): (bird forms)]

or take the simpler form of a flask bottle:

[Illustration (f006b): (bottle forms)]

or a jar on the same principle:

[Illustration (f006c): (jar forms)]

or, simpler still, a leaf form, putting in the stem first with one
stroke (1):

[Illustration (f006d): (leaf forms)]

and bui