nt while posing, particularly if the room be close. Look out for
this; watch your sitter, and see that she is not looking tired. The
minute that you see the least sign of fatigue, if she shows
pallor--rest. Do not get so absorbed in your canvas that you do not
notice your model's condition. If you are observing and studying your
model as closely as you should, you can hardly fail to notice any
change that may occur, and you should at once give her relief.

=Distance.=--Don't work too near your model, nor too near your canvas.
As regards the first, be far enough away to see the whole of the
figure you are painting, or of that part which you are doing, entirely
at one focus of the eye, and yet near enough to see the detail
clearly. If you are too near, you see parts at a time, and do not see
it as a whole. If you are too far, you see too generally for good
study. You might make it a rule to be away from your subject a
distance of about three or four times the extreme measurement of it.
If it is a full length, say fifteen to twenty feet, if you can get so
large a room. If it is a head and shoulders, about six or eight feet.
Never get closer than six feet.

As to your canvas, work at arm's length. Don't bend over--again you
see parts, and you must treat your canvas as a whole. Never rest your
hand or arm on the canvas. Train your arm to be steady. Sit up
straight, hold your brush well out at the end of the handle, and your
arm extended; now and then, if you need closer work, lean forward, and
if necessary use a rest-stick; but as a rule your work will be
stronger and hang together better if you work as I have suggested. Of
course you will often get up, and walk away from your work. Set your
easel alongside the model, and go away to a distance, and compare
them. Too intense application to the canvas forgets that relations,
effect, and wholeness of impression are of the greatest importance,
and are only to be judged of when seen at some distance.

=Background.=--Under the general title of background you may place
everything which will come in as accessory to the figure, and against
or alongside of which it stands. The picture must "hang together";
must have envelopment; must be a whole, not an aggregation of parts.
Everything that goes to the making up of this whole must have a
natural and logical connection with it. From the first conception of
the picture you must consider the background as an essential part of
it, and a