Page 22 [22]
OCR
2 LIGHT AND WATER regard with impatience any attempt to dissect these wonders of nature, or to reduce her magic to a dry system. But in his study of anatomy or perspective the artist does not disdain to call in science to his aid, and in the same way the student will find that an elementary knowledge of the fixed rules which light obeys as it falls upon water or emerges from it, will help him in no small degree to avoid errors of drawing or colouring which he might otherwise have perpetrated, and may also prove a valuable assistance to his memory when he attempts to record effects which are of a nature so essentially changing and fugitive. In the first chapter is explained the formation of the image in perfectly still water. In the second the water is supposed to be rippled, and the consequent distortion of the image is discussed. In neither of these chapters is the colour of the water itself considered; we are so far occupied only with the form of the reflexions, and the transparency of the water is for the present ignored. In the subsequent chapters we are more particularly concerned with the question of colour. In the third chapter, the water being assumed to be still, it is shown to what extent this local colour is apparent under different conditions of vision. Finally, in the fourth chapter, the same considerations are applied to a rippled surface. The principles involved are exceedingly simple, and when any one of them is considered alone, as in Chapters I and II, there is little or no difficulty in its application. But as a matter of fact the principles are often ignored and mistakes result. Most people will remember instances of sketches being en
