rong colors, and contracts in winter to grays. Indeed,
Nature, who would seem to be the source of our notions of color harmony,
rarely repeats herself, yet is endlessly balancing inequalities of hue,
value, and chroma by compensations of quantity.

(80) So subtle is this equilibrium that it is taken for granted and
forgotten, except when some violent disturbance disarranges it, such as
an earthquake or a thunder-storm.

+The triple nature of color balance illustrated.+

(81) The simplest idea of balance is the equilibrium of two halves of a
stick supported at its middle point. If one end is heavier than the
other, the support must be moved nearer to that end.

But, since color unites three qualities, we must seek some type of
_triple balance_. The game of jackstraws illustrates this, when the
disturbance of one piece involves the displacement of two others. The
action of three children on a floating plank or the equilibrium of two
acrobats carried on the shoulders of a third may also serve as examples.

[Illustration: Fig. 14.]

(82) Triple balance may be graphically shown by three discs in contact.
Two of them are suspended by their centres, while they remain in touch
with a third supported on a pivot, as in Fig. 14. Let us call the lowest
disc Hue (H), and the lateral discs Value (V) and Chroma (C). Any dip or
rotation of the lower disc H will induce sympathetic action in the two
lateral discs V and C. When H is inclined, both V and C change their
relations to it. If H is raised vertically, both V and C dip outward. If
H is rotated, both V and C rotate, but in opposite directions. Indeed,
any disturbance of V affects H and C, while H and V respond to any
movement of C. So we must be prepared to realize that any change of one
color quality involves readjustment of the other two.

(83) Color balance soon leads to a study of optics in one direction, to
aesthetics in another, and to mathematical proportions in a third, and
any attempt at an easy solution of its problems is not likely to
succeed. It is a very complicated question, whose closest counterpart is
to be sought in musical rhythms. The fall of musical impulses upon the
ear can make us gay or sad, and there are color groups which, acting
through the eye, can convey pleasure or pain to the mind.

(84) A colorist is keenly alive to these feelings of satisfaction or
annoyance, and consciously or unconsciously he rejects certain
combinations of color and a