ality. It is
quite true that in certain objects, blue is a _sign_ of distance; but
that is not because blue is a retiring color, but because the mist in
the air is blue, and therefore any warm color which has not strength of
light enough to pierce the mist is lost or subdued in its blue: but blue
is no more, on this account, a "retiring color," than brown is a
retiring color, because, when stones are seen through brown water, the
deeper they lie the browner they look; or than yellow is a retiring
color, because, when objects are seen through a London fog, the farther
off they are the yellower they look. Neither blue, nor yellow, nor red,
can have, as such, the smallest power of expressing either nearness or
distance: they express them only under the peculiar circumstances which
render them at the moment, or in that place, _signs_ of nearness or
distance. Thus, vivid orange in an orange is a sign of nearness, for if
you put the orange a great way off, its color will not look so bright;
but vivid orange in sky is a sign of distance, because you cannot get
the color of orange in a cloud near you. So purple in a violet or a
hyacinth is a sign of nearness, because the closer you look at them the
more purple you see. But purple in a mountain is a sign of distance,
because a mountain close to you is not purple, but green or gray. It
may, indeed, be generally assumed that a tender or pale color will more
or less express distance, and a powerful or dark color nearness; but
even this is not always so. Heathery hills will usually give a pale and
tender purple near, and an intense and dark purple far away; the rose
color of sunset on snow is pale on the snow at your feet, deep and full
on the snow in the distance; and the green of a Swiss lake is pale in
the clear waves on the beach, but intense as an emerald in the sunstreak
six miles from shore. And in any case, when the foreground is in strong
light, with much water about it, or white surface, casting intense
reflections, all its colors may be perfectly delicate, pale, and faint;
while the distance, when it is in shadow, may relieve the whole
foreground with intense darks of purple, blue green, or ultramarine
blue. So that, on the whole, it is quite hopeless and absurd to expect
any help from laws of "aerial perspective." Look for the natural
effects, and set them down as fully as you can, and as faithfully, and
_never_ alter a color because it won't look in its right place. Put t