[The best drill for the eye and hand that we know of can be obtained in
the shortest time by getting Buskin's "_Elements of Drawing_," and doing
faithfully and exactly all the exercises which he prescribes, including
both those in black-and-white and color. Many people, however, do not
care for this drill, but prefer to make a few bad imitations of simple
chromos, and consider that equipment enough for architectural work. For
those, Penley's large work, the "_System of Water-Color Painting_" is
the best for copying from; or the aspirant may get some of the little
Winsor and Newton "_Handbooks on Sketching in Water-Colors_," to show
him how to choose and mix his pigments, and use as models to copy from
some of the colored prints of architectural subjects which are to be
picked up in the stores. There is a good deal of choice among these. We
have ourselves published one or two, from originals by Mr. Botch, which
will answer as well as anything we know, being admirable in color and
architectural feeling, and just sketchy enough. Pains should generally
be taken _not_ to make an elaborate picture of an architectural sketch,
and the processes preliminary to making a highly-finished water-color
painting, such as laying a ground-color of neutral orange, and sponging
it partly out, cutting out foreground lights with a knife, and so on,
are best dispensed with. Chinese white, also, should be used very
sparingly, and only where the scale is so small that it appears in the
form of dots. A good lesson on the importance of keeping color subdued,
for the sake of heightening architectural effect, can be derived from
any of Front's works, which, by the way, might with great advantage be
used to copy from. These will show the value of what most students
consider beneath their notice--work in two tints and give the best
models possible of artistic distribution of light and shade.--EDS.
AMERICAN ARCHITECT.]
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[Illustration: NOTES AND CLIPPINGS]
THE DUTY ON GLASS AS IT AFFECTS CONSUMERS.--In a letter to the _New York
Times_, Mr. J.S. Moore writes: As I am on the subject of glass, and as
the members of the Pan-American Congress are inspecting our magnificent
metropolis, I wish to call their attention to two subjects. First, our
dirty streets, and second, our splendid windows. Dickens has
immortalized the "Golden Dustman." In this city we have the "Dirty
Ringman," or we may say "Ringmen." There have been millions in New
York's dirty streets. The most honest and persevering Mayors and other
high officials have got stuck in New York street mud and were never
heard of again. Our aristocratic home mud has flourished without any
protection, and the pauper mud of Europe or any other mud could never
beat our home product. Here our amiable and friendly Commissioners of
the Pan-American Congress can see it demonstrated that our mud industry
can flourish without protection. I will now call the attention of our
Pan-American friends to the windows in New York houses. They are
invariably of plate-glass, and there is not a city in the world that can
beat New York in handsome windows. Now, then, it is an actual fact that
the tax or duty on plate-glass is as follows: Plate-glass, 10 by 15
inches, 3 cents per foot, or 13.60 per cent; plate-glass, 16 by 24
inches, 5 cents per foot, or 19.78 per cent; plate-glass, 24 by 30
inches, 8 cents per foot, or 27.46 per cent. Now, we must admit that
this is a moderate tax. The above glass goes into the houses of the
rich. Of course, it will not do to tax influential and rich citizens.
But now let me show how we tax that class of people who build
three-hundred-dollar houses, or the hundreds of thousands of farmers who
live in the far West. Those houses are glazed by what is known as common
green window glass. Let me show to what extent we have taxed that class
of people in 1888: