actness and freedom; and the
exactness must come first. The structure of the thing must be shown
without unnecessary detail. You should always look at any really good
drawing you can come at, and try to see what there may be in it of
helpful suggestion to you.

[Illustration: =Drawing of Hands.= _Duerer._]

=Study the Masters.=--Get photographs of drawings by the masters of
drawing, and study them. See how they searched their model for form
and character. Do not make so much of the actual stroke as the manner
in which it is made to express and lend itself to the meaning.

In this drawing by Albrecht Duerer you have a splendid example of
exactness and feeling for character. You could have no better type of
what to look for and how to express it. Although it is not important
that you should lay on the lines of shading just as this is done, it
is important to notice how naturally they follow, and conform to, the
character of the surface--which is one of the ways in which the point
helps to search out the modelling.

This drawing is made with a black and a white chalk on a gray ground;
a very good way to study.

A good hint is also offered in this drawing, of the modesty of the old
masters, in subject. A hand or part of any object is enough to study
from. There is no need to always demand a picture in everything you
do.

=Materials.=--For all purposes which come in the range of the painter
you should use charcoal. For purposes of study it is the most
satisfactory of materials; it is sensitive, easily controlled, and
easily corrected. For sketching or preliminary drawing on the canvas
it is equally good.

You should have also a plumb-line with which to test vertical
positions of parts in relation to each other, and this, with the
pencil held horizontally for other relative positions, gives you all
you need in that direction.

In drawing on the canvas it is not often necessary to do more than
place the various objects and draw their outlines carefully and
accurately. Sometimes, however, as in faces, or in pictures which
include important figures, you will need a shaded drawing, and this
can be done perfectly with charcoal, and fixed with fixative
afterwards.

=Imitation.=--Perfect drawing, in the sense of exact drawing, is not
the most important thing. A drawing may be exact, and yet not be the
truer for it. It may be inexact, and yet be true to the greater
character. So, too, the drawing may have to change an ac