f "Alice," by Mr. Chase, where the crisp edges
of a white dress are relieved against a dark ground, such treatment is
impossible. Here, however, the device of flying ribbons is a most clever
one, which, besides giving the effect of motion, causes an interruption in
these clean-cut outlines, as also in the formal spaces on either side.
The horizontal accent of dark through the centre of the canvas, suggesting
a grand piano in the dim recesses behind, fulfills a like obligation from
the linear as well as tonal standpoint.

ANGULAR COMPOSITION BASED ON THE HORIZONTAL

As the vertical may be termed the figure painters' line so the horizontal
becomes the line of the landscape painter. Given these as the necessary
first things, the picture is made by building upon and around them. The
devices which aid the figure painter in disposing of one or many verticals
have been briefly viewed. A consideration of the horizontal will
necessarily take us out of doors to earth and sky, where nature constructs
on surfaces which follow the horizon.

The problem in composition which each of these lines presents is the same
and the principle governing the solution of each identical; balance by
equalization of forces. _Given a line which coincides with but one side of
the picture it becomes necessary for the poise of the quadrilateral to
cross it with an opposing line._ The rectangular cross, though more
positive and effective, is no more potential in securing this unity than
the crossing of lines _at a long angle._ A series of right angles will in
time arrive at the same point as the _tangent,_ but less quickly. Each
angle in such an ascent produces the parity of both horizontal and
vertical. The tangent expresses their synthesis. In Fortuny's
_"__Connoisseurs,__"_ the right angle formed by the line of the mantel and
the statue takes the eye to the same point as the tangent of the shadow.
Again, the principle allows the modification of any arm of the cross,
maintaining only the fact of the cross itself. When a line passes through
the first or necessary line of construction it has, so to speak,
incorporated itself as a part of the picture, and what it becomes
thereafter is of no great importance. If the reader will make simple line
diagrams of but a few pictures, this point will be made clear, and it will
be found that such diagrams which represent either the actual lines of
direction or lines of suggestion from point to point