f his canvas will not bother him beyond the
effect that it has upon his attaining of that expression.

=Scraping.=--The second painting will be well dry before the third
begins, especially if the paint be more rough and uneven than is for
any reason desirable. Almost every painter scrapes his pictures more
or less. There is pretty sure to be some part of it in which there is
roughness just where he doesn't want it. For the third painting, that
is to say, after the main things in the picture are practically
entirely finished, there remains to be done the strengthening and
richening and modifying of the colors, values, and accents, and the
bringing of the whole picture together by a general overworking.
Before this begins, the picture may need scraping more or less all
over. If it does need it, you may use a regular tool made for that
purpose; or the blade of a razor may be used, it being held firmly in
such a position that there is no danger of its cutting the canvas.

It is not necessary to scrape the paint smooth, but only to take off
such projections and unevenness of paint as would interfere with the
proper over-painting.

The third painting represents any and all processes that may be used
to complete the picture. There is no rule as to the number of
processes or "paintings." You may have a dozen paintings if you want
them, and after the first two they are all modifications and
subdivisions of the third painting; for they all add to furthering the
completion of the picture. They are all done more or less from nature,
as the second painting was. There should be very little done to any
picture without constant reference to nature.

If you glaze your picture, glaze one part at a time. Don't "tone" it
with a general wash of some color. That is not the way pictures are
"brought into tone," nor is that the purpose of the glaze. The glaze,
like any other application of paint, is put on just where it is needed
to modify the color of that place where the color goes. The use of a
scumble is the same; and both the glaze and the scumble will be
painted into and over with solid color, and that again modified as
much as is called for. The thing which is to be carefully avoided is
not the use of any special process, but the ceasing from the use of
some process or other before the thing is as it should be,--don't stop
before the picture represents the best, the completest expression of
the idea of the picture.

This completen