pecially the Greek,
mind, and knowing that my friend, Mr. C. Newton, had devoted much
thought to the elucidation of the figurative and symbolic language of
ancient art, I asked him to draw up for me a few notes of the facts
which he considered most interesting, as illustrative of its methods of
representing nature. I suggested to him, for an initiative subject, the
representation of water; because this is one of the natural objects
whose portraiture may most easily be made a test of treatment, for it is
one of universal interest, and of more closely similar aspect in all
parts of the world than any other. Waves, currents, and eddies are much
liker each other, everywhere, than either land or vegetation. Rivers and
lakes, indeed, differ widely from the sea, and the clear Pacific from
the angry Northern ocean; but the Nile is liker the Danube than a knot
of Nubian palms is to a glade of the Black Forest; and the Mediterranean
is liker the Atlantic than the Campo Felice is like Solway moss.

Mr. Newton has accordingly most kindly furnished me with the following
data. One or two of the types which he describes have been already
noticed in the main text; but it is well that the reader should again
contemplate them in the position which they here occupy in a general
system. I recommend his special attention to Mr. Newton's definitions of
the terms "figurative" and "symbolic," as applied to art, in the
beginning of the paper.

* * * * *

In ancient art, that is to say, in the art of the Egyptian, Assyrian,
Greek, and Roman races, water is, for the most part, represented
conventionally rather than naturally.

By natural representation is here meant as just and perfect an imitation
of nature as the technical means of art will allow: on the other hand,
representation is said to be conventional, either when a confessedly
inadequate imitation is accepted in default of a better, or when
imitation is not attempted at all, and it is agreed that other modes of
representation, those by figures or by symbols, shall be its substitute
and equivalent.

In figurative representation there is always _impersonation_; the
sensible form, borrowed by the artist from organic life, is conceived to
be actuated by a will, and invested with such mental attributes as
constitute personality.

The sensible _symbol_, whether borrowed from organic or from inorganic
nature, is not a personification at all, but the convent