g_ Nature!

To copy well, or even tolerably, is all that most amateurs ever arrive
at: to draw from nature, originally, seems placed out of the reach of
all, but those who devote a great part of their existence to it; and
yet, to copy nature, is a goal that all would reach if they could! Try
it, and behold the miserable production that is the result! without a
previous devotion to its laws.

Instead of for ever copying, it will be found of more importance to be
continually exercising the _memory_. 'A _mere_ imitator or copyist,'
says Dagley, 'dare not lose sight of his model, lest he should lose
himself!'

In sketching from nature, always survey the object at _every point_ the
nature of the ground will permit, as it prevents the disappointment
arising from having completed your work, and afterwards seeing it from a
point that would have given you greater advantages.

Whenever a pencil or pen is at hand, practice continually the
perpendicular, horizontal, and diagonal lines; then strike circles out,
or any other flowing lines, which practice will eventually give that
flow to the hand which is understood by freedom. When power is acquired
over these, _their combinations form Drawing_, in all its picturesque
varieties. It is in the power of all to attain these forms and essential
parts of drawing, with the same, or more facility, than the forms of
writing are acquired.

'No object you can place in your picture, can possess its proper value,
unless it is in its proper place;--out of that place, it can only create
disorder.'

The size of a figure, or any other object, should denote the distance at
which it is situated: so should the colour of it retire in the _same_
proportion.

The eye should be distant from the picture twice the length of it.

The most natural point of sight, is the level of a man's eye, standing
up; which should be the line of the horizon, or where the sky meets it.
All mountains should rise above that line.

If a figure be placed on the bottom line of the picture, it should be
the natural size, and all others diminish as they recede, in an exact
proportion to their distance, care being taken that they never have the
appearance of going up steps; all buildings, trees, &c., being governed
by the same rule. Thus the second figure or object, being the same
distance from the first as the first is from the eye, presuming them
both to be of the same size in nature, the second will appear _half_ the