significant and calm view of the exterior forms of the sitter, an
expressive map of the individuality of those forms, leaving you to form
your own intellectual judgments. A simple, rather formal, attitude is
usually chosen, and the sitter is drawn with searching honesty. There is
a great deal to be said for this point of view in the hands of a painter
with a large appreciation of form and design. But without these more
inspiring qualities it is apt to have the dulness that attends most
literal transcriptions. There are many instances of this point of view
among early portrait painters, one of the best of which is the work of
Holbein. But then, to a very distinguished appreciation of the
subtleties of form characterisation he added a fine sense of design and
colour arrangement, qualities by no means always at the command of some
of the lesser men of this school.

Every portrait draughtsman should make a pilgrimage to Windsor, armed
with the necessary permission to view the wonderful series of portrait
drawings by this master in the library of the castle. They are a liberal
education in portrait drawing. It is necessary to see the originals, for
it is only after having seen them that one can properly understand the
numerous and well-known reproductions. A study of these drawings will, I
think, reveal the fact that they are not so literal as is usually
thought. Unflinchingly and unaffectedly honest they are, but honest not
to a cold, mechanically accurate record of the sitter's appearance, but
honest and accurate to the vital impression of the live sitter made on
the mind of the live artist. This is the difference we were trying to
explain that exists between the academic and the vital drawing, and it
is a very subtle and elusive quality, like all artistic qualities, to
talk about. The record of a vital impression done with unflinching
accuracy, but under the guidance of intense mental activity, is a very
different thing from a drawing done with the cold, mechanical accuracy
of a machine. The one will instantly grip the attention and give one a
vivid sensation in a way that no mechanically accurate drawing could do,
and in a way that possibly the sight of the real person would not always
do. We see numbers of faces during a day, but only a few with the
vividness of which I am speaking. How many faces in a crowd are passed
indifferently--there is no vitality in the impression they make on our
mind; but suddenly a face will r