und being thus secured, a transparent
warm oil-priming, in early practice flesh-colored, was usually passed
over the entire picture. This custom, says Mr. Eastlake, appears to have
been "a remnant of the old habit of covering tempera pictures with a
warm varnish, and was sometimes omitted." When used it was permitted to
dry thoroughly, and over it the shadows were painted in with a rich
transparent brown, mixed with a somewhat thick oleo-resinous vehicle;
the lighter colors were then added with a thinner vehicle, taking care
not to disturb the transparency of the shadows by the unnecessary
mixture of opaque pigments, and leaving the ground bearing bright
_through the thin lights_. (?) As the art advanced, the lights were more
and more loaded, and afterwards glazed, the shadows being still left in
untouched transparency. This is the method of Rubens. The later Italian
colorists appear to have laid opaque local color without fear even into
the shadows, and to have recovered transparency by ultimate glazing.

125. Such are the principal heads of the method of the early Flemish
masters, as stated by Mr. Eastlake. We have marked as questionable the
influence of the ground in supporting the lights: our reasons for doing
so we will give, after we have stated what we suppose to be the
advantages or disadvantages of the process in its earlier stages,
guiding ourselves as far as possible by the passages in which any
expression occurs of Mr. Eastlake's opinion.

The reader cannot but see that the _eminent_ character of the whole
system is its predeterminateness. From first to last its success
depended on the decision and clearness of each successive step. The
drawing and light and shade were secured without any interference of
color; but when over these the oil-priming was once laid, the design
could neither be altered nor, if lost, recovered; a color laid too
opaquely in the shadow destroyed the inner organization of the picture,
and remained an irremediable blemish; and it was necessary, in laying
color even on the lights, to follow the guidance of the drawing beneath
with a caution and precision which rendered anything like freedom of
handling, in the modern sense, totally impossible. Every quality which
depends on rapidity, accident, or audacity was interdicted; no
affectation of ease was suffered to disturb the humility of patient
exertion. Let our readers consider in what temper such a work must be
undertaken and carried th