ficulty and learn to overcome it.

Other lines that possess a direct relation to a rectangular shape are
the diagonals. Many compositions that do not hang on a vertical or
horizontal basis are built on this line, and are thus related to the
bounding shape.

[Illustration: Plate XXXVI.

THE SURRENDER OF BREDA VELAZQUEZ (PRADO)

_Photo Anderson_]

When vertical, horizontal, or diagonal lines are referred to, it must
not be assumed that one means in all cases naked lines. There is no pure
vertical line in a stone pine or cypress tree, nor pure horizontal
line in a stretch of country, but the whole swing of their lines is
vertical or horizontal. And in the same way, when one speaks of a
composition being hung upon a diagonal, it is seldom that a naked
diagonal line exists in the composition, but the general swing is across
the panel in harmony with one or other diagonal. And when this is so,
there is a unity set up between the design and its boundaries. A good
instance of vertical, horizontal, and diagonal lines to unite a picture
is Velazquez's "The Surrender of Breda," here reproduced. Note the
vertical chord in the spears on the left, continued in the leg of the
horse and front leg of the figure receiving the key, and the horizontal
line made by the dark mass of distant city, to be continued by the gun
carried over the shoulder of the figure with the slouch hat behind the
principal group. Velazquez has gone out of his way to get this line, as
it could hardly have been the fashion to carry a gun in this position,
pointing straight at the head of the man behind. Horizontal lines also
occur in the sky and distant landscape, one running right through the
group of spears. The use of the diagonal is another remarkable thing in
the lines of this picture. If you place a ruler on the slanting line of
the flag behind the horse's head to the right, you find it is exactly
parallel to a diagonal drawn from the top right-hand corner to the lower
left-hand corner. Another line practically parallel to this diagonal is
the line of the sword belonging to the figure offering the key, the
feeling of which is continued in the hand and key of this same figure.
It may be noted also that the back right leg of the horse in the front
is parallel to the other diagonal, the under side of it being actually
on the diagonal and thus brought into relation with the bounding lines
of the picture. And all these lines, without the artifice being too