_. You cannot unite his
manner with theirs; choice between them is sternly put to you, when
first you touch the steel. Suppose, for instance, you have to engrave,
or etch, or draw with pen and ink, a single head, and that the head is
to be approximately half an inch in height more or less (there is a
reason for assigning this condition respecting size, which we will
examine in due time): you have it in your power to do it in one of two
ways. You may lay down some twenty or thirty entirely firm and visible
lines, of which every one shall be absolutely right, and do the utmost a
line can do. By their curvature they shall render contour; by their
thickness, shade; by their place and form, every truth of expression,
and every condition of design. The head of the soldier drawing his
sword, in Duerer's "Cannon," is about half an inch high, supposing the
brow to be seen. The chin is drawn with three lines, the lower lip with
two, the upper, including the shadow from the nose, with five. Three
separate the cheek from the chin, giving the principal points of
character. Six lines draw the cheek, and its incised traces of care;
four are given to each of the eyes; one, with the outline, to the nose;
three to the frown of the forehead. None of these touches could anywhere
be altered--none removed, without instantly visible harm; and their
result is a head as perfect in character as a portrait by Reynolds.

81. You may either do this--which, if you can, it will generally be very
advisable to do--or, on the other hand, you may cover the face with
innumerable scratches, and let your hand play with wanton freedom, until
the graceful scrabble concentrates itself into shade. You may
soften--efface--retouch--rebite--dot, and hatch, and redefine. If you
are a great master, you will soon get your character, and probably keep
it (Rembrandt often gets it at first, nearly as securely as Duerer); but
the design of it will be necessarily seen through loose work, and
modified by accident (as you think) fortunate. The accidents which occur
to a practiced hand are always at first pleasing--the details which can
be hinted, however falsely, through the gathering mystery, are always
seducing. You will find yourself gradually dwelling more and more on
little meannesses of form and texture, and lusters of surface: on cracks
of skin, and films of fur and plume. You will lose your way, and then
see two ways, and then many ways, and try to walk a little dist