es of values of contours, and make your
figure relieve by the contrast of value in mass rather than by the
modelling within the outline. See how the figure "tells" as a whole
against what is behind it first, and keep all within that first
relation.

[Illustration: =Buckwheat Harvest.= _Millet._]

It is possible to look for and to find many of the qualities which
distinguish the figure in the studio light; sometimes you may want to
do so. The telling of a story, the literary side of the picture, if
you want that side, sometimes needs help that way. But in this you
lose larger characteristics, and the picture as a whole will not have
the spirit of open air in it.

What has been said of the painting of landscape applies to the
painting of figures in landscapes. Pose your figure out-of-doors if
you would represent it out-of-doors. Then paint it as if it were any
other out-door object. If the figure is more important to the
composition than anything else in the landscape, as it often will be,
then study that mainly, and treat the rest as background, but as
background which has an influence which must be constantly recognized.

Never finish a figure begun out-doors by painting afterwards from a
model posed in the house. Leave the figure as you bring it in. If it
is not finished, at least it will be in keeping with itself; and this
will surely be lost if you try to work it from a model in different
conditions.

=Animals.=--Animals should be considered as "figures out-of-doors."
There is no essential difference in the handling one sort of a figure
or another. The anatomy is different, and the light falls on different
textures, but the principle is not changed. You must consider them as
forms influenced by diffused light and diffused color, and paint them
so. You will find that often, especially in full sunlight, the color
peculiar to the thing itself is not to be seen at all. The character
of the light which falls on it gives the note, and controls. In the
shade the effect is less marked, but the constant flicker makes the
same sort of variation, though not to the same extent.

There is no secret of painting animals either in the house or
out-of-doors which is not the same as the secret of painting the human
figure. If you would paint an animal, get one for a model and study
it. Work in some sort of a house-light first, in a barn or shed, or,
if it be a small animal, in your studio. Study as you would any other
thing, f