hen it is best to set these puzzling examples aside, and to await
patiently the elucidation, which may come from some source of which we
are as yet ignorant.

In very early art we have little remaining but patterns, on which we
may found theories by tracing them home to their original source. The
oldest patterns had each a meaning and an intention. When a pattern
has been enduring and far spread, it is because it was originally the
expression of an idea or a symbol.

In the earliest dawn of civilization, the arts were the repositories
of the myths and mysteries of national faiths. Embroidery was one of
these arts, and the border which edged the garment of a divinity, the
veil which covered the grave of a loved one, or the flower-buds and
fruit which fringed the hangings and curtains in the sanctuary, each
had a meaning, and therefore a use. These symbolical designs and forms
were constantly reproduced; and all human ingenuity was exercised in
reforming, remodelling, and adding perfect grace to the expression of
the same idea.

* * * * *

Patterns may be ranged under four heads--the Primitive, the
Naturalistic, the Conventional, and the Geometrical.

The primitive are those of which we know not the ancestry, and rarely
can guess the motive. To us they are, in general, simply rude
decorations. The naturalistic are those which are borrowed from
natural forms, and are either only imitative, or else convey some
hidden meaning. The conventional are those which, by long descent,
have come to be accepted simply as ornamental art, with or without
reference to an original motive, now lost. The geometrical or
symmetrical are founded on form only, and in so far resemble our
experience of the primitive; they express no meaning, and only serve
to satisfy the eye by their balance and their ingenuity.

PRIMITIVE.

The first patterned forms with which we are acquainted are the
primitive. They are found in all parts of the inhabited world. In our
present ignorance as to the beginnings of the scattered tribes of men,
we cannot judge if these are the remains of an earlier art or the
first germs of a new one. Of one thing there is no doubt: this
primitive decoration consists entirely of pattern; that is to say, of
the repetition of certain (to us) inexpressive forms, which by
reiteration assume importance and in some degree express beauty--the
beauty of what Monsieur Blanc calls "cadence."

After