f a land of
enchantment, which, without labour, with little more than a wave of the
hand, transfixes the artist's touch, and turns it into concrete; by
which the most delicate and hasty strokes of the pen are not merely
recorded in fac-simile for the eye to decipher, but are brought out in
sharp relief, as bold and strong as if hewn out of a rock! Here is an
argument for doing "the best and truest work we can," a process that
renders indestructible--so indestructible that nothing short of
cremation would get rid of it--every line that we put upon paper; an
argument for learning for purposes of illustration the touch and method
best adapted for reproduction by the press.[13]

[Illustration: "A SILENT POOL." (ED. W. WAITE.) (_From "Academy
Notes," 1891._)]

GELATINE PROCESS.

By this process a more delicate and sensitive method has been used to
obtain a relief block.

The drawing is photographed to the required size (as before), and the
_negative_ laid upon a glass plate (previously coated with a mixture of
gelatine and bichromate of potash). The part of this thin, sensitive
film not exposed to the light, is absorbent, and when immersed in water
swells up. The part exposed to the light (_i.e._, the lines of the
drawing) remains near the surface of the glass. Thus we have a sunk
mould from which a metal cast can be taken, leaving the lines in relief
as in the zinc process. In skilful hands this process admits of more
delicate gradations, and pale, uncertain lines can be reproduced with
tolerable fidelity. The blocks take longer to make, and are double the
price of the photo-zinc process first described. There is no process yet
invented which gives better results from a pen-and-ink drawing for the
type-press. These blocks when completed have a copper surface. The
reproductions of pencil, chalk, or charcoal drawings by the zinc, or
"biting-in" processes are nearly always failures, as we may see in some
of the best artistic books and magazines to-day.

[Illustration: No. XVI.

"_The Miller's Daughter_," by E. K. JOHNSON.

Another very interesting example of Mr. E. K. Johnson's drawing in pen
and ink. Nearly every line has the value intended by the artist.

The drawing has been largely reduced, and reproduced by the gelatine
relief process.]

[Illustration: "THE END OF THE CHAPTER." (FROM THE PAINTING BY W.
RAINEY.)

[_Royal Academy, 1886._]

(_Reproduced by the old Dawson process._)]