CHARCOAL DRAWINC 
 
 KARL ROBERT. 
 
 


 
 
 
 
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CHARCOAL DRAWING 
 
 WITHOUT A MASTER. 
 
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KARL ROBERT-LE^FUSAIN 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING 
 
 WITHOUT A MASTER 
 
 A- COMPLETE PKACTICAL TEEATISE 0^^ LANDSCAPE 
 DRAWING IN CHARCOAL 
 
 rOLLOAVED BY LESSONS ON 
 
 STUDIES AFTER ALLOUGfi 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE FOURTH EDITION, BY 
 
 ELIZABETH HAVEN APPLETON 
 
 CINCINNATI 
 ROBERT CLARKE & CO 
 1880 
 
TO MY DEAR MASTER, 
 
 AUGUSTE ALLONGE, 
 
 HIS AFFECTIONATE PUPIL, 
 
 IvAKL EGBERT. 
 
TKANSLATOR’S PREFACE. 
 
 It is undeniable that lie is the best trans- 
 lator who can transmute the spirit of one 
 language into that of another. To translate 
 properly is to clothe the ideas of a foreign 
 author with a garment of our native words 
 which shall fit them as well as did their 
 original robe ; to give the idiom of one lan- 
 guage by its corresponding idiom in another ; 
 not simply to change the French word into 
 an English one. It is the spirit and not the 
 letter that is asked for by the reader. 
 
 But true as these rules may be when we 
 judge of translations of purely literary works, 
 — history, belles lettres, etc.— they need to 
 
 ( 7 ) 
 
8 
 
 translator’s preface. 
 
 be applied with discretion to translations of 
 scientific works or of technical treatises like 
 this before us. There, exactness is more 
 needed than elegant and idiomatic English. 
 
 If, in the chapters on the Material of the 
 Atelier and in the Lessons from the Plates, 
 I have sacrificed the style to a careful and 
 close rendering of the words of Robert, I am 
 sure that the student who makes a practical 
 use of this book will thank me for the sac- 
 rifice. E. H. A. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Charcoal Drawing is certainly the most 
 rapid, convenient and agreeable method of 
 work for artists, and especially for amateurs, 
 who desire to bring back from a journey or 
 an excursion any notes of the impression pro- 
 duced upon them by the scenes they have 
 passed through, or of the numerous pictorial 
 effects which nature has presented to them. 
 
 The use of charcoal for landscape draw- 
 ing is only of a few years’ standing, but it 
 has rapidly become popular, because, while it 
 does not exact much study, it gives prompt 
 and satisfactory results. For this reason we 
 have thought it might be useful to amateurs 
 
 ( 9 ) 
 
10 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 to have a practical treatise upon the differ- 
 ent ways of executing this new kind of draw- 
 ing. 
 
 Already several very interesting pam- 
 phlets, written on this subject, have initiated 
 the world into this manner of interpreting 
 nature. But most of these works have either 
 been incomplete or have treated their subject 
 simply from the point of view of the author, 
 generally an artist ; consequently they are 
 without those simple explanations which a 
 student needs — not from any want of know- 
 ledge in the author, but, on the contrary, be- 
 cause, being an artist, he has forgotten the 
 difficulties which beset a beginner. Few 
 artists would consent to undertake a work 
 which, to be really useful, must be thoroughly 
 jwactical and on a level with the student. 
 
 In the treatise which we submit to our 
 readers, they may see that we have made 
 every effort to be as clear as possible ; we 
 have not been afraid to enter into the sim- 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 11 
 
 plest details, even at the risk of being 
 charged with puerility ; for we are convinced, 
 from our constant intercourse with amateurs 
 and students, that it is precisely that very 
 information which no one thinks of giving, 
 because it appears so simple, that is really the 
 most needful to persons pursuing any study 
 whatever without the help of a master. 
 
CHAECOAL DEAWING. 
 

THE ORIGIN OF CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING AS APPLIED TO THE 
 HUMAN FIGURE. 
 
 It does not appear, from the examination 
 of the cartoons in the Museum of the Louvre, 
 that the ancient painters knew any thing of 
 Charcoal Drawing. The honor derived from 
 its use belongs entirely to modern artists ; 
 nor is this surprising, since, as we shall see 
 further, the very invention of charcoal cray- 
 ons is recent. 
 
 The first application of Charcoal Drawing 
 
 ( 15 ) 
 
IG 
 
 CHATICOAL DRAWING. 
 
 was to the human figure. Certain painters 
 made use of it, at first, in the studies for 
 their pictures. 
 
 The School of Fine Arts (L’Ecole des 
 Beaux-Arts) admitted it at once for the 
 sketches submitted to the Academy ; and, 
 little by little, artists carried their charcoal 
 drawings farther than mere sketches ; for, as 
 they found that this new kind of crayon gave 
 to their work a stronger character than those 
 employed before, they adopted it for the en- 
 tire picture. 
 
 The employment of the charcoal crayon 
 dates from the years 1847 and 1848, when one 
 of the greatest French historical painters, 
 Adolphe Ivon,* gave his earliest studies to the 
 
 ^Adolphe Ivon, French painter, born at Esche- 
 viller (Moselle), 1817, pupil of Paul Delaroche, made, in 
 1843, a journey to Eussia, whence he brought back a 
 series of studies, which he made use of for the beauti- 
 ful drawings exhibited at the Exposition of J847, and at 
 that of 1848. He sent out, next, the “ Battle of Kouli- 
 
ORIGIN OF CHARCOAL DRAWING. 17 
 
 public ; studies, where, by the aid of charcoal 
 crayon, heightened sometimes by water color 
 or by oil, he succeeded in obtaining those 
 brilliant and dramatic effects which placed 
 him immediately in the front rank of modern 
 artists. The Museum of Havre possesses a 
 complete example of his finest composition 
 in his “Seven Cardinal Sins.” 
 
 Later, he succeeded in reproducing, in this 
 
 kowo,” in 1850; “Marshal Ney encouraging the Ar- 
 riere Guard” tthe Retreat from Russia), in 1855; “The 
 Seven Capital Sins,” also in 1855; “The Taking of 
 Malakoff,” 1857; “The Gorge of Malakoff,” 1858; 
 “ The Fortifications of Malakoff,” 1859 ; and, last, “ The 
 Independence of the United States of America,” in 1870. 
 This last picture, much criticised, is none the less a 
 grand page in history, where can be found the imprint 
 of strong talent joined to learned composition. M. Ivon 
 obtained a first medal in 1848, a second medal in 1855, 
 the grand medal of honor in 1857, a second medal at 
 the Universal Exposition of 1866. l!lamed Chevalier 
 the Legion of Honor in 1855, he was promoted to the 
 grade of officer in 1867. 
 
18 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 manner, certain souvenirs of Russia, where 
 he executed, after nature, a series of studies 
 which, to-day, have become very valuable. 
 He proved also, by drawings made to illus- 
 trate some works on art and on history, espe- 
 cially by his illustrations of the History of 
 Russia, that this kind of design would take 
 the place, even for book illustrations, of al- 
 most all the processes employed before, be- 
 cause of its wonderful power of giving effect 
 to military or to historical scenes. 
 
 In our time. Charcoal Drawing has been 
 followed by genre painters. In the first rank 
 among them we would mention E. Bayard, 
 whose reputation has been established by his 
 souvenirs of that year so fatal to us, 1870-71, 
 and by his charming compositions, Before'"^ 
 and After the War.” M. Gelibert has also 
 employed charcoal with success and, by its 
 use, has given a still greater originality to 
 his drawings of animals and to his hunting 
 
 scenes. 
 
ORIGIN OF CHARCOAL DRAWING. 19 
 
 Painters on glass have made use of char- 
 coal, for a long time, for their designs or pat- 
 terns for their work, on account of the facility 
 of treating rapidly the shadows of drapery or 
 of architecture offered them by the charcoal 
 crayon ; but the outlines are always traced 
 by the black crayon or the’ lithographic pen- 
 cil, which gives them a certain required 
 sharpness. 
 
 The names which we have cited prove 
 that Charcoal Drawing lends itself easily to 
 any artistic reproductions, that it can reach 
 up to high art as well as it can throw off a 
 mere fantasy. 
 
 But it excels above all in landscape, as we 
 hope to prove ; and it is for this reason that 
 this branch of art has taken so firm a posi- 
 tion and has spread itself so widely and rap- 
 idly among amateurs. 
 
<r^ 
 
 OF CHAECOAL DEAWINO AS APPLIED TO 
 LANDSCAPE. 
 
 ALLONGE, APPIAN, BELLEL, T.ALANNE, PvEYE. 
 
 As soon as tlie first start was given to 
 Charcoal Drawing, the landscape painters 
 profited most by it. Even Decamps made 
 use of it ; by the medium of Charcoal Draw- 
 ing he gave those lovely inspirations and that 
 severe style which made such an impression 
 on the artistic world. Troyon, Paul Huett 
 and others followed in this new path, — and 
 now there is not a landscape painter who 
 does not put a package of charcoal crayons 
 with his working materials when he starts on 
 an excursion. And he is right. This means 
 of rendering in a few minutes, a view, an 
 ( 20 ) 
 
ORIGIN OF CHARCOAL DRAWING. 21 
 
 effect, has a charm for the landscape jDainter, 
 who can thus bring back, from even a short 
 journey, a collection of varied studies, each 
 one bearing the impress of nature. More- 
 over, the new material aids the artist in his 
 progress by giving a variety to his work 
 which can never be attained by those who do 
 not make use of it. 
 
 Still, we do not mean to say that Charcoal 
 Drawing should ever take the place of paint- 
 ing ; we mean, only', that the study of it 
 ought to precede the use of color, and we are 
 ready to affirm that every artist who gives 
 his attention to that study will, thereby, 
 strengthen his talent. 
 
 As to the superiority of Charcoal Drawing 
 over all other means of rendering landscape, 
 painting excepted, we shall not here undertake 
 to demonstrate it. M. Allonge, in his book, 
 which can be considered as the “Esthetics of 
 Charcoal,” has well shown that superiority for 
 a broad interpretation of nature, and he brings 
 
22 
 
 CHAECOAL DEAWING. 
 
 out the full value of the charcoal crayon, 
 when he compares it with the black-lead pen- 
 cil, which is thin and harsh even in rendering 
 the smallest effects. 
 
 To appreciate the numberless resources 
 which the use of charcoal offers, we have only 
 to look at the works of the masters who have 
 brought it to perfection, and to study them 
 carefully. Messieurs Allonge, Appian, Bellet, 
 Lalanne, each in a different style, have ar- 
 rived at the most complete results. Bellet, 
 ' the eldest, seems to be the one who has made 
 the fewest concessions to modern taste. His 
 fine and severe compositions come evidently 
 from classic models. We feel there an inno- 
 vation only in the material employed ; the 
 mode of employment remains the same, the 
 black crayon would give the same effects. 
 The other masters, on the contrary, have 
 changed, if I may so express myself, the gen- 
 eral tone of their works : if the material is 
 new, the manner of working it is so likewise. 
 
OEIGIN OF CHAECOAL DEAWING. 23 
 
 And all these artistically capricious methods 
 of working in charcoal are the very cause of 
 the variety we find in it. 
 
 Adolphe Appian, of Lyons, ^ has joined 
 figure to landscape, with a wonderful har- 
 mony. Every one can judge of his success 
 at the Luxembourg Museum, where one of 
 his finest compositions, “ The Return from the 
 Fields,” was placed some years ago. The 
 landscape, perhaps sacrificed a little to the 
 figure, is not, for that, the less broadly treated ; 
 but how fine this figure is, how full of a 
 charming and natural grace ! Certainly this 
 
 * Adolphe Appian, born at Lyons, pupil of L’Ecole 
 des Beaux-Arts in that city, and of Corot and Dau- 
 bigny, exhibited for the first time a design in charcoal, 
 in 1855, and was soon publicly noticed. He put out, 
 successively, very beautiful charcoal drawings of the 
 borders of the Isere, of the valley of Optorez, of the 
 environs of Nice, etc. This artist obtained a medal in 
 Paris, in 1868, at Eochelle, at Pengireaux, at Lyons, 
 etc., and recently, in Vienna, two gold medals, in the 
 departments of painting and of etching. 
 
24 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 is not the peasant woman of our modern real- 
 ists. The artist has put his heart in it, and, 
 under this rustic dress, it is rather the mother 
 than the peasant woman that he has tried to 
 make us admire. Unhappily, the works of 
 this master are not yet much known in Paris ; 
 the people of Lyons, who admire him, have 
 monopolized him almost entirely, and then 
 Charcoal Drawing gains a footing in Paris 
 only little by little, thanks to the efforts of 
 some merchants connected with artists.* Here 
 we should like to relate an anecdote, which 
 proves the want of intelligence of those peo- 
 ple who are in the best position to make a 
 new talent known to the world. 
 
 M. Appian, as modest as he is full of 
 talent, wished, some time ago, to let himself 
 
 * We mention especially M. Dangleterre, picture 
 framer, Hue de Seine, who, in 1855, divined, from the 
 early works of M. Allonge, what that young artist 
 would become; and, in the same way, M. Berville savv 
 the future merit of Ma:xime Lalanne. 
 
ORIGIN OF CHARCOAL DRAWING. 25 
 
 be known in Paris as an artist in charcoal ; 
 his merit as a painter being already estab- 
 lished, as it had brought him a medal at the 
 Exposition. He called the attention of the 
 best known picture dealer in Paris to the 
 study of Charcoal Drawing ; and, on offering 
 to place one of his drawings in his shop, ob- 
 tained the privilege as a great fay or. A short 
 time afterward, he found this very drawing in 
 a loft, the glass which covered it broken, the 
 drawing in a pitiable state. Then he deter- 
 mined neyer to make the trial again. We 
 hope, however, that the eminent artist will re- 
 consider this decision, which is to be regretted 
 by every lover of Charcoal Drawing. 
 
 Maxime Lalanne is one of those land- 
 scape artists who strike at first sight by their 
 originality. What does he need to make a 
 charcoal sketch? A corner, an old street, 
 a chateau in ruins. Sober in details, he 
 treats Charcoal Drawing a little too much like 
 
26 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 etching, in which he excels, but what poetry, 
 what perfect taste in his choice of a subject! 
 ^ “Allonge,”' said once F. Petit, the learned 
 
 * Auguste Allonge, born in Paris in 1833, pupil of 
 L’Ecole des Beaux- Arts, rewarded by a medal in tlie 
 School, in 1853; crowned by the Academy, in 1854; ex- 
 hibiting, for the first time, at the Universal Exposition 
 cf 1858, a large design, “ Souvenir of the “ Gorge-aux- 
 Loups ;” and after this, every year, paintings and draw- 
 ings. The best known are “ The Ponds of Pcray,” 
 charcoal ; “ Sheep in the Island of Creteil,” a painting ; 
 “The Fountain of Sainte-Barbe” (Morbihan), char- 
 coal; “The Sea at Portrieux ;” “ The Willow Thicket 
 Inundated,” 1866, a charcoal drawing, bought by M. 
 Prince Stirbey; “The Yalley of Gouet,” 1868, paint- 
 ing; “The Beach at Tillers, ” painting; “The Footpath 
 to the Fountain” (Tillers), charcoal, 1839 ; “October in 
 the Forest,” painting; “ The Talley of Hygeres,” char- 
 coal, 1870; “Tiew of the City of Puy,” painting, 
 bought by the government ; “ Solitude,” charcoal, 1872 ; 
 the Salon of 1873, and the Exposition in Tienna, 1873, 
 belonging to M. Delaporte, of St. Quentin; “L’Hj^ere 
 a Crosne,” painting ; “The Pool,” a charcoal drawdng, 
 bought by M. the Count of Audiffret. And, at the last 
 
ORIGm OF CHARCOAL DRAWING. 27 
 
 artistic expert, “Allonge is Charcoal Drawing, 
 and Charcoal Drawing is simply Allonge.” 
 Indeed, it would seem that this master has 
 given every effect possible to his material. 
 Let him treat a woodland scene, the banks 
 of a river, a group of willows, the open 
 country, mountains or sea, we feel always 
 the artist, born painter, who paints by the 
 help of a single color. But what myriads 
 of tones in this blackness of charcoal ! What 
 a just feeling of values, what a charm in 
 that perspective full of light, in those forms, 
 always elegant and graceful ! 
 
 To conclude, amateurs may see now, at 
 Messieurs Groupil, Boulevard Montmartre, a 
 new style of Charcoal Drawing ; I mean the 
 
 Salon, “The Sea,” a picture, bought by the govern- 
 ment ; “ A Farm of N’ormandy,” charcoal, bought by M. 
 Colas. Since he gained his medal at L’Ecole des Beaux- 
 Arts, M. Allonge has obtained a large number of prizes ; 
 at Paris, in 186G, for Fine Arts applied to Industry, the 
 first gold medal, at Havre, La Eochelle, Bourges, etc. 
 
28 CHAKCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 works of M. Reye. Although we are not 
 very partial to his manner of interpreting 
 A nature by means of an absolute white and 
 an intense black, applied to a paper first 
 covered with gum and spread with white 
 lead, yet we recognize the true talent there 
 to be taken into account, and we see that, 
 if the artist would conform to modern tastes 
 and ideas, he would be very near taking 
 rank as a master. It is above all in half 
 tints and distant j^lanes that Charcoal Draw- 
 ing has its great charm ; thus any one who 
 neglects these, becomes harsh. M. Reye is 
 a pupil of Calame and he has not yet laid 
 aside the mantle of his master. Now, Ca- 
 lame, who had a well-deserved success in his 
 own time, is a little out of fashion in our 
 day ; and this is not surprising, landscape 
 painting having made considerable progress 
 in fifty years. We hope that M. Reye will 
 pardon us our frankness, but if we permit 
 ourselves to judge in this way his original 
 
OEIGIN OF CHAECOAL DEAWING. 29 
 
 works, it is because we are convinced that 
 the public may discuss his talent to-day, and 
 even criticise it, only to admire it to-morrow 
 without restriction. 
 
 Considered from the amateur’s point of 
 view. Charcoal Drawing is the only study 
 that can give a serious result to amateur 
 work ; and if every father of a family un- 
 derstood what resources were to be found 
 against idleness in developing’ in young peo- 
 ple a taste for drawing by this simple means, 
 there soon would not be a man having re- 
 ceived a certain amount of education, who 
 would not know how to employ his leisure 
 agreeably in the country, or even in a city, 
 where every one vrould take pleasure in 
 passing his evenings in his own family, seated 
 before his easel. 
 
 We go out of our subject, it is true, but 
 we have always regretted that in our schools, 
 of art the study of landscape is set aside. 
 Certainly we do not wish to deny the utility 
 
30 
 
 CHAUCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 of academic studies, but out of the hundred 
 young men who follow a course of design, 
 ten or twenty, perhaps, profit really by the 
 instruction which is given them; the others, 
 on the contrary, taking for excuse their want 
 of taste, become discouraged and make no 
 progress. This would never happen if the 
 study of landscape was admitted ; then, on 
 leaving the school, loving an art in which 
 they had acquired a certain facility, they 
 would devote th^ir leisure to it. 
 
THE FUKNITURE OF THE ATELIER, 
 
THE 
 
 FURNITURE OF THE ATELIER; 
 
 If it has passed into a proverb that he is 
 a bad workman who complains of his tools, 
 it is certain that to have good ones simplifies 
 work, renders it more agreeable and brings 
 a more satisfactory result. Therefore we 
 shall not be afraid of being too diffuse in 
 this chhpter, or of entering into the small- 
 est details concerning the different access- 
 ories necessary to the study of Charcoal 
 Drawing. Whether you are an artist by pro- 
 
 CSS) 
 
34 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 fession or are only a lover of sketching*, 
 surround yourself with every thing that can 
 be useful to you, and, believe the words of 
 experience, ^you will gain a serious advan- 
 tage from this precaution. 
 
 The Easel. 
 
 The furniture of an atelier is composed, 
 first, of an easel ; and we believe, if one does 
 much work, it will be best to procure a me- 
 chanical easel, called the Easel Bonhomme, 
 because the common easels with three feet, 
 very convenient for small drawings, will not 
 support the frame sufficiently if you are 
 working upon a design larger than the board 
 called the supporter ; for then there will be 
 constantly a movement from right to left 
 and from left to right, under the pressure 
 
THE FUKNITUKE OF THE ATELIER. 35 
 
 of the hand during the work. If you can 
 not obtain an easel Bonhomme, you may 
 make use of the common easel with three 
 feet, which is much less costly and almost 
 as convenient. And you can even obviate 
 the inconvenience of which we spoke above, 
 by placing at the height of about twenty-two 
 inches on the movable supporter when it is 
 arranged for the hand in working seated, a 
 cross-piece of wood, fixed by nails or move- 
 able by the help of screws held by small 
 nuts ; a cross-piece, which, being of the same 
 size as the supporter, will very easily hold 
 the frame. This will not be very agreeable 
 to the sight, but it will render the same ser- 
 vice as the mechanical easel. If you prefer 
 the latter, take one with a fixed stand, less 
 easily broken than a sliding stand. ' We say 
 nothing of the easels provided with pulleys ; 
 they are seldom used now, on account of the 
 difficulty, when the supporting board is once 
 
36 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 raised, of drawing it down at need without 
 shaking it. 
 
 As to the easel for* holding the model, 
 with a singte stand and cross feet, it is, in 
 our opinion, altogether useless, seeing that, 
 by the help of a hook fixed at the top of 
 the easel on which you are working, you can 
 always hang up your model, which will be 
 supported by the very frame on Avhich you 
 are making your copy. If the model is too 
 large to permit this arrangement, you can 
 place it on a chair, on a table easel or on 
 a common one ; but in no case should you 
 make use of the model-bearing easel, which 
 is never firm enough to hold a large draw- 
 ing, and which the least touch would shake. 
 
THE FURNITUEE OF THE ATELIER. 37 
 
 The Frame. 
 
 In the atelier, a frame is the best thing 
 on which to stretch your paper, it is also 
 the cheapest, and indeed it is the only thing 
 which stretches well and which oiFers a proper 
 resistance. The frame ought to be made 
 like those which you employ for canvas, but 
 it need not be furnished with braces. And, 
 moreover, it will be found convenient to at- 
 tach^ to it, at the middle of the back, a 
 cross-piece of wood, which, when the draw- 
 ing is finished, will permit you to hold it 
 easily in order to set it. 
 
 ^ We say “attach,” because if you insert the cross- 
 piece into the frame, as you do in those used for 
 canvas, you will find it troublesome to set the draw- 
 ing, the brush not passing easily under the bar. 
 
38 
 
 CHAECOAL DEAWING. 
 
 You must not be discouraged if, the first 
 time you stretch your paper, the result is 
 not jDerfect. It is a matter of habit, and we 
 assure yoi\ that, if you conform exactly to the 
 instructions which we give you here, you 
 will succeed in stretching your paper rapidly, 
 without wrinkles, which never can be done 
 with the ordinary stretcher. 
 
 To stretch your paper, after having cut 
 it large enough to overlap the frame about 
 an inch and a half on each side, you lay it 
 on a table, the right side or, better, the 
 grain^ of the paper, against the table ; then, 
 by the help of a little sponge, you moisten 
 the wrong side from one end to the other. 
 The paper thoroughly moistened, you lay 
 the frame upon it and fasten one of the sides 
 with tacks, one in the middle and one at 
 each end. This done, you turn your frame, 
 and repeat the same operation for the oppo- 
 site side, then go on in the same way for 
 the other two sides, taking care to press 
 
THE EURNITUEE OF THE ATELIER. 39 
 
 down the corners of the paper in drawing 
 them a little over the edge of the frame. 
 This work ought to he done as rapidly as 
 possible. When the paper is thus held at 
 each of the four sides by the three tacks, . 
 you should place between them as many 
 other nails as you think needed, according 
 to the size of the paper. 
 
 To stretch a paper well, put tacks- at dis- 
 tances of about an inch and a half and, whilst 
 you are putting them in, draw the paper, so as 
 to stretch it as much as possible while it is 
 moist, but do this gently, that it may not 
 tear under your hands. This work finished, 
 let the paper dry at the temperature of the 
 weather ; at the end of a half hour in winter 
 and a quarter of an hour in summer, it will be 
 as well stretched as a painting can vas. In win- 
 ter you must be very careful not to dry it be- 
 fore the fire for, in that case, the paper will 
 wrinkle at a lower temperature and become 
 loosened while you are working at it. 
 
40 
 
 CHAKCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 The Stretcher, 
 
 All instrument composed of two frames 
 shut, one into the other, or placed and held, 
 one above the other, by means of brads and 
 clasps ; this is used very commonly for stretch- 
 ing the paper in Charcoal Drawing. For the 
 firsf kind of stretcher, you need only place 
 the moistened paper over the larger frame, 
 then, placing the second frame upon the first, 
 press it until you close the machine. For the 
 second kind of stretcher, the use of it is still 
 more simple ; you place the paper very evenly 
 between the two frames and fold them at 
 once, one over the other. This stretcher is 
 convenient for out-of-door sketching, since you 
 do not need all the apparatus of the frame, 
 nails, hammer, etc., but it is very inferior for 
 
THE FURNITUKE. OF THE ATELIER. 41 
 
 work in the atelier. The stretcher with 
 clasps, drawing horizontally upon the paper, 
 tears it easily when it dries and stretches. 
 The other instrument, drawing the paper by 
 means of a ledge which enters one of the 
 frames from the other, tears it very easily 
 also, especially in the corners. But there is a 
 third stretcher which combines all the desired 
 conditions. It is composed of two frames 
 which, laid over each other, shut together by 
 means of an interior groove. Moreover, it is 
 improved by a frame covered with linen or 
 muslin, which permits you to carry the draw- 
 ing, without injury, before it is set. In this 
 way, you may give several days to a draw- 
 ing from nature. This stretcher has not the 
 fault of the first mentioned, because the cor- 
 ners are free, and it does not tear the paper, 
 like the second, because the tension is not 
 horizontal. But, to be absolutely perfect, this 
 machine needs such care in its construction. 
 
42 
 
 CHAECOAL ,DEAWING. 
 
 that the price is necessarily too high to j iistify 
 any merchant in keeping it on hand. 
 
 The Charcoal Crayons.* 
 
 You can certainl}^ draw with all kinds of 
 charcoal crayons ; nevertheless, it is well to 
 have, for landscape drawing in charcoal, those 
 of a superior quality. The common crayon 
 used in sketching, ought to be rejected, for it 
 is better to employ, for the sketch, the same 
 crayon which is used to finish the drawing. 
 The artists’ charcoal crayon, marked E.. Gr. M., 
 is certainly the best. It is the natural wood, 
 
 V 
 
 * Fusain, s. m. Term of botan)^. A shrub which 
 grows naturally along hedges, whose wood serves to 
 make distatfs, spindles, carding needles, etc. ; or, re- 
 duced to charcoal, is employed to draw light sketches. 
 Spindle-tree or Prick wood (Euonymus). — Dictionary of 
 the Academy. 
 
THE FURNITURE OF THE ATELIER. 43 
 
 and simply charred with care; unctions and 
 pleasant to handle, it gives the most intense 
 blacks and, at the same time, the softest 
 grays for the background and the more dis- 
 tant planes, when you work it down with 
 a stomp. For details and fine branches it is 
 well to make use of a crayon made from the 
 little shrub called mignonette,^ which, harder 
 than the other, is quite as black and does not 
 crumble from the pressure of the hand. It 
 can be cut to as fine a point as possible, so 
 that you can render with it the most tender 
 twigs and the lightest details. 
 
 The Yenitian charcoal crayon is not bad, 
 but it is no better than the R. Gr. M., and it 
 costs much more. There is also the charcoal 
 crayon made from the broom handle ; f a kind 
 of hard wood, thick as a candle, which, cut 
 
 * A viiriety of Besida^ with a woody stem, lar^^er 
 than the mignonette cultivated here. 
 
 f Rather indefinite, as we do not know from what 
 kind of wood broom handles are made in France. 
 
44 
 
 CHAECOAL DRAWING. 
 
 flat, serves well for skies, and for even tints 
 on a broad surface. 
 
 But there is a kind of crayon called soaked 
 {trempe) which you must never use. These 
 crayons, which are nothing but common char- 
 coal dipped into a comjiosition making a 
 black liquid, are far from having the worth of 
 the natural crayon. Dry and hard, they in- 
 terfere continually with good work and are, 
 at the very best, only fit for sketches. I 
 know that the paper in which they are 
 wrapped is a great attraction ; but, in this 
 case, contrary to the proverb, the flag does 
 not cover the merchandise. 
 
 We do not approve of vigorous retouches 
 by the aid of the black or lithographic crayon. 
 They take from the Charcoal Drawing the 
 softness which characterizes it ; but still there 
 are some cases where a sharp touch is useful. 
 The crayon H. Conte is, then, the best to em- 
 ploy. Pulverized charcoal is now used, some- 
 times, for skies, background and retouches. 
 
THE FURNITURE OF THE ATELIER. 45 
 
 The Paper. 
 
 In the two most interesting and most prac- 
 tical pamphlets which have been written on 
 Charcoal Drawing, those of Lalanne and of 
 Allonge, there is such a direct opposition in 
 the recommendations of the paper to be em- 
 ployed, that we will quote the two para- 
 graphs and give afterward our own opinion 
 on the subject, specifying the manner in 
 which the student may use with advantage 
 either kind of paper. 
 
 M. Lalanne says, “If the paper has a 
 certain roughness, like that of grained paper, 
 it will catch the friable particles of the char- 
 coal and, whatever be the subject you wish to 
 treat, you will do w^ell, after having cut your 
 crayon, to pass a general tone over every 
 
46 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 thing, which will give, as it were, a com- 
 mencement of values. You will not have to 
 work afterwards on a white surface, but upon a 
 preparatory background already established. 
 This value may be modified according to the 
 different planes of the subject.” In Allonge 
 we find, on the contrary, “ What forces me to 
 condemn those papers which have too rough a 
 grain, or any regular divisions, is that I find 
 it absolutely necessary, for the background, to 
 be able to lighten the tone, in order to render 
 it more delicate, in accordance with its plane, 
 however vigorous it may be as a tone. The 
 same is true in the representation of water. 
 Yow, if the grain of the paper gives, in the 
 background, the same effects as in the fore- 
 ground, it forces you to lea\ e, in your Avork, 
 sharp, white points in every light, however 
 much these lights may differ the one from 
 the other; you will have neither jhanes nor 
 values, for this white grain will render the 
 yellow as well as the green, the dull tones as 
 
THE FUENITURE OF THE ATELIER. 47 
 
 well as the brilliant ones, and the pictorial 
 aspects of your work will disappear.” 
 
 This objection to the employment of rough 
 paper appears to us very just; for, putting 
 aside the fact that it is very difficult, in pre- 
 paring a general tone as M. Lalanne directs, 
 to obtain, with such paper, a fine, even and 
 every-where equal tone where the grain shall 
 not appear, we meet, in using it, another 
 obstacle. Between the roughnesses which 
 catch the crayon, we see the tint of the pa- 
 per itself; and this, far from giving a fresh 
 and distant tone, leads the pupil to make 
 drawings in which the sky and the water are 
 unsteady, and where the ground itself wants 
 solidity. Moreover, this paper is so light in 
 its quality that it is difficult to use it on the 
 frame or on the stretcher. It can only be 
 used on blocks or on a pasteboard as it is pre- 
 pared for the Academy ; this can never give 
 the delicacy of paper that is stretched. 
 
 But still, we must not condemn this rough 
 
48 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 paper entirely : in the first place, because M. 
 Lalanne, making use of it with his talent, has 
 really obtained J:he result of which he speaks ; 
 and secondly, because we believe that, in cer- 
 tain cases, it facilitates execution, especially 
 when you wish to reproduce ruins, villages, old 
 picturesque streets and buildings in fact. 
 But we must proscribe this paper on princi- 
 ple, in all teaching, because in using it the 
 23upil will have to conquer difficulties which a 
 good paper does not present. Therefore, we 
 advise the papers used by M. Allonge and M. 
 Appian, which are a dull yellow or else white, 
 with a fine and even grain. With these papers 
 you can treat every subject, provided you 
 know how to modify and vary your work ac- 
 cording to the nature of the subject you wish 
 to reproduce. 
 
 There is no other special precaution to be 
 given with regard to the paper, except to keep 
 it always pure and clean, and, in putting it on 
 the frame or on the stretcher, to take care not 
 
THE FURNITURE' OF THE ATELIER. 49 
 
 to moisten the side on which you are going to 
 draw, as this makes spots which are difficult 
 to get rid of. 
 
 We never employ, and we counsel our 
 readers against employing, tinted papers. If 
 you desire to obtain a general yellow tint, 
 dissolve a little saffron in your white fixative. 
 
 Stomps, Spills, Pank, W'adding, Linen 
 and Woolen Rags, Pith of the Elder- 
 Bush, The Employment and the Pre- 
 servation of Bread-Crumbs. 
 
 All these accessories and their manner 
 of employment have so much importance, in 
 our opinion, that w^e can not content ourselves 
 with simply giving a list of them. 
 
 The paper stomp is that most frequently 
 used. All paper stomps, being made in the 
 same way, are equally good ; to keep them so, 
 
50 
 
 CHAECOAL DRAWING. 
 
 you have only to press them with care, im- 
 mediately after your work, to prevent them 
 from losing their point ; otherwise you can no 
 longer obtain delicate results — they will be 
 good for nothing except for flat work. 
 
 The flat stomp, called the hare’s foot, is 
 very useful for obtaining a uniform tone on a 
 broad surface ; you should always use it for 
 reflections in the water. 
 
 Amongst other stomps, those of leather, of 
 silk, of cork, etc., the leather stomp is the 
 only one which appears to us of any use in 
 Charcoal Drawing. It obtains clear tones 
 and half-tints. It is generally used in broad 
 tints, wdiich the paper stomp would not make 
 lio’ht enough and which bread-crumb would 
 make too light. 
 
 Spills render nearly the same service as 
 paper stomps, especially for small surfaces. 
 They are more supple, more agreeable to han- 
 dle and, besides, much cheaper. Indeed, you 
 
THE FURNITUEE OF THE ATELIER. 51 
 
 can make them yourself with gray paper, 
 blotting paper or silk paper. 
 
 The Rag. 
 
 To pass a general tone over your paper, 
 and take from it the crudeness of the white, 
 and also to obtain sky values, you should gen- 
 erally use the palm of the hand or the four 
 lingers joined, after having laid on, as regu- 
 larly as possible, the quantity of charcoal 
 necessary to obtain the regular values. But 
 if you want a brilliant and clear sky ordrans- 
 parent and luminous water, the use of a piece 
 of old linen or of old cotton is excellent. You 
 must roll up the rag so that it may present a 
 broad and even surface, then, turning it from 
 the bottom of your paper toward the top, you 
 can spread the charcoal. But, to prevent this 
 
52 
 
 CHAECOAL DRAWING. 
 
 operation from doing harm to the work which 
 follows it, it must he performed with skill ; it 
 should he done, so to say, at the first trial ; 
 otherwise, if you are obliged to make several 
 attempts, the charcoal, sinking too much into 
 the paper, will give a tone either too light or 
 too dark, according to the quantity first placed 
 there ; and then, even with the help of hread- 
 crumh, you can never obtain a fresh light nor 
 a brilliant and lively tone to lighten a cloud 
 or a sunbeam on the water. To obtain this 
 same general tone, many persons use glove 
 kid, punk, wadding, etc. But these are infe- 
 rior to the rags ; they are more difficult to 
 use, they often make spots or cottony, heavy, 
 disagreeable skies. You may use them to 
 mark out the clouds, but not for the tone of 
 the background or clear sky, which ought 
 always to be smooth and even. You can ob- 
 tain this tone only by the aid of the rag. Use, 
 for that purpose, j)ulverized charcoal, covering 
 with it the roll of cloth which we have just 
 
THE FUEI^ITURE OF THE ATELIER. 53 
 
 described. This will give a soft and light 
 tone, one on, which you then can model your 
 clouds. 
 
 The Bread-Crumb. 
 
 Carefully crumbled and worked into a flat 
 or pointed lump, it is used, as we know, for 
 the most brilliant lights. You must always 
 use stale, home-made bread ; fresh bread will 
 grease the paper and injure your retouches. 
 To keep your bread-crumb, you must press it 
 into a little metal box, lead or tin, such as are 
 sold for snuff-boxes. In that way, you can 
 keep it two or three days, according to the 
 season. This is a very convenient way of 
 keeping it, especially on excursions ; the box 
 of bread-crumb takes up but little space and 
 yet you can press in enough to serve for sev- 
 eral drawings. 
 
54 
 
 CHAECOAL DEAWINO. 
 
 The Eraser. 
 
 This iEstriiment fills a role important 
 enough in Charcoal Drawing to make it neces- 
 sary to choose it with care ; it is used to ob- 
 tain middle tints in the details of the work, 
 where the stomp or the spill would not give 
 enough delicacy of touch. You may use it ad- 
 vantageously for the foliage of trees on the 
 second plane, and also on the first planes, to 
 mark out grass, furze and reeds. Let the 
 eraser he always very sharp, otherwise it will 
 take off the surface of the paper and, in fix- 
 ing the drawing, the liquid will make a smutch. 
 The common eraser, fixed or shutting into its 
 case by means of a groove, is excellent ; but 
 what is still better is the eraser called the 
 scalpel. With the point you can obtain a 
 
THE FURNITURE OF THE ATELIER. 55 
 
 great delicacy of touch and with the edge 
 you may work upon broader surfaces than 
 with the common eraser. Moreover, this 
 eraser is more conveniently held between the 
 fingers and allows you to work always in the 
 same direction. 
 
 The Fixative. 
 
 DIFFERENT WAYS OF FIXING OR SETTING THE CHARCOAL. 
 
 Indirect Fixation (the fixative a])plied to the 
 hack of the pa]oer '). — The fixing of Charcoal 
 Drawing, when the work is finished, needs 
 very great care. There have been many prep- 
 arations employed up to this time ; but we 
 must confess that none of them give a posi- 
 tively good result. You may suspect quack- 
 ery in all those inventors who claim complete 
 
56 
 
 CHAECOAL DRAWING. 
 
 f 
 
 success on this point. The first fixative em- 
 ployed was that of Durozier, used especially 
 by painters on glass. It sets the drawing 
 well and is well enough for sketches on 
 pasteboard, etc. ; but it gives to the paper a 
 very disagreeable yellow tone which destroys 
 its effect ; above all, it hurts an effect of light. 
 Moreover, in passing over the paper, it gives 
 a shiny look to the drawing, Avhich takes 
 away the principal charm of Charcoal Draw- 
 ing, that dead tone which gives its value and 
 its harmony. 
 
 The other fixatives, those of M. Douget, 
 M. Berville, etc., being of nearly the same 
 composition, give about the same result, in 
 spite of the claims of their inventors ; but 
 the fixative Meusnier, adopted by Allonge and 
 his pupils, who prefer it to all others, has the 
 advantage of ’ being suitable for direct fixa- 
 tion without the necessity of cleaning the ap- 
 paratus during the work, a disagreeable oper- 
 ation of which ^^e shall speak presently. As 
 
THE FURNITURE OF THE ATELIER. 57 
 
 to the manner of fixing the drawing, it is the 
 opinion generally adopted and the only true 
 one, that Charcoal Drawings fixed on the 
 back of the paper, are always the most per- 
 manent.^ This is besides the most convenient 
 and rapid method. You pour the preparation 
 into a cup or a saucer, and then by the aid of 
 a flat brush, which you will fill with the fixa- 
 tive by dipping it into the liquid, you 
 moisten your drawing on the wrong side, hold- 
 ing the same by the cross piece at the back. 
 When the drawing is well covered with the 
 fixative, you must dry it as rapidly as possi- 
 ble, in the sun in summer, and not far from 
 the fire in winter. The fixative, drying rap- 
 
 *The superiority of the fixative Meusnier is incon- 
 testible ; its only inconvenience is the strong odor 
 which characterizes it; to avoid this, it will be well to 
 fix your drawing near an open window and to keep the 
 bottle well corked when it is not in use. This fixative 
 can be obtained from any color merchant or dealer in 
 > artistic materials. 
 
58 
 
 CHAECOAL DEAYv'ING. 
 
 
 I 
 
 idly, catches the charcoal dust on the paper, 
 makes it adhere and, so to say, sets it in the 
 drawing. We point out the use of the cup as 
 most economical ; but, if you do n’t care for 
 that, you can pour the liquid on the back 
 of your drawing and spread it every-Avhere, 
 equally, with the brush. But in this way you 
 lose a great deal of your fixative and the draw- 
 ing is no better set. 
 
 Direct Fixation (the fixative ap][)lied to the 
 drawing itself ). — Artists generally use for 
 this purpose, and wrongly, we think, the 
 blowing apparatus Bouget. We regret not 
 to be of the opinion with regard to it of M. 
 Maxime Lalanne, and these are the reasons 
 which make us judge it differently. In the 
 first place, direct fixation is far from giving, 
 instantaneously, the promised result. You 
 must repeat the operation several times and, 
 for this, you must wait each time until the 
 paper dries, to obtain the same permanent 
 setting that you get by indirect fixation. 
 
THE FUKNITUEE OF THE ATELIER. 59 
 
 Then the use of this apparatus is not' easy, 
 because it must be cleaned every time it is 
 used ; otherwise it gets dirty and the capil- 
 lary tube, which is the base of the invention, 
 becomes choked up. And, if you blow too 
 quickly or if you bring the instrument too 
 near the drawing, the atomization is not 
 complete — a jet of the liquid may strike the 
 drawing, dragging along with it the charcoal 
 and making a smutch imj)ossible to retouch, 
 and in one minute you may lose the work of 
 several hours. Lastly, blowing by the mouth 
 being necessarily irregular, you can never 
 obtain an absolute regularity of the vapor. 
 You must give up this instrument above all 
 in sketching from nature. 
 
 It results from what we have just said, 
 that direct fixation ought never to be em- 
 ployed except when it is indispensable, that 
 is to say, when you wish to fix a design on 
 cloth, silk, etc. ; for a sketch prepared for 
 painting or for screens, fans, and the like. 
 
60 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 In that case, the best apparatus is that used 
 in ^nedicine for the atomization of mineral 
 waters, obtained by the atomizer of rubber, 
 invented by Galand. We know that this in- 
 strument is more expensive than that of Roii- 
 get but it is much less fragile, and gives so 
 much better results, that it is good economy 
 to employ it. Then, the wind not being given 
 by the mouth but by two balls pressed alter- 
 nately, the atomizing tube does not become 
 choked, and thus you avoid the cleaning, a 
 tiresome operation, especially when working 
 from nature. 
 
 Material for the Country. 
 
 It is well to reduce, as much as possible, 
 your material for out-door work, for you never 
 know, in starting, if the view which charms 
 you will be near home or if you will be ob- 
 
THE FURNITUEE OF THE ATELIER, 61 
 
 ligecl to make a long tramp before finding it. 
 It is a good habit to work on your lap, and 
 thereby get rid of the field easel, Avhich, in 
 spite of all the ingenuity of the manufactu- 
 rers, is always heavy enough to tire you. 
 
 But you will do well always to have a camp- 
 stool, for, in sitting on the ground,^ you are 
 often troubled by the horizon, which then ap- 
 pears above your eye, or by the first planes, 
 to w^hich you can not give sufficient preponder- 
 ance. If you wish to make careful studies or 
 harmonious drawings, it is well to provide 
 yourself with an umbrella ; for, if you are 
 sketching in the open country in the sun- 
 shine, no matter what vigor you may give to 
 your drawing, it will always appear gray ; you 
 
 *“From time to time, the artist should stoop, to as- 
 sure himself that the lines of the landscape which he 
 has found harmonious when viewed standing, will pre- 
 sent the same rhythm when he has altered the perspec- 
 tive point of view, by sitting down .” — The Landscape 
 Artist in the Fields by F. Henriet. 
 
62 
 
 CHAECOAL DRAWING. 
 
 work it up and you are surprised, on return- 
 ing to your atelier, to find that you have 
 made a drawing extremely black, recalling 
 the touch of the crayons of Conte or of the 
 lithographic pencil ; the planes have no longer 
 their relative values and your design has the 
 fault of harshness, an unpardonable fault in 
 Charcoal Drawing. 
 
 As to all those boxes for Charcoal Draw- 
 ing, made like the field boxes for oil painting, 
 and in general all apparatus of this sort, be 
 careful not to embarrass yourself with them. 
 A few charcoal crayons, a stomp, two or three 
 spills, the snutf-box with the bread-crumb, 
 an eraser — all these can be put in your pocket, 
 and it is just because this mode of drawing is 
 the least troublesome that it is the most 
 agreeable. There is only the box for the 
 frame that appears to us really useful. This 
 is a sort of open box, which has neither top 
 nor bottom and in which you can fasten the 
 frames of stretched paper b^^ means of copper 
 
THE FURNITURE OF THE ATELIER. 63 
 
 clamps. Gret the lightest boxes possible. By 
 the help of a little strap on the handle you 
 can carry the little tin can holding the fixa- 
 tive, and in the same way you can fasten the 
 camp-stool and the umbrella. 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
STUDY AFTER THE MASTERS. 
 
 THE CHOICE OF MODELS. 
 
 There is a sentence often repeated to those 
 who are beginning the study of drawing or of 
 painting; this is, “Be yourself, try to be 
 original ; success lies there.” Certainly, when 
 well understood, this is an absolute truth. 
 But it does not therefore follow that it is 
 useless to copy models or that you should 
 work from nature without any previous study. 
 
 It is very true that, by dint of labor and 
 
68 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 perseverance, you can reach good results from 
 nature, above all if you are endowed with a 
 special talent for drawing. But this treatise 
 is not written for the few exceptional artists 
 by birth — its object is to be useful to ama- 
 teurs, not to interest artists. Therefore we 
 tell the amateur that to begin at once to draw 
 from nature will be a mistake for him. He 
 should subject his hand and his eye to work, 
 less agreeable, it is true, but more useful. 
 By copying you obtain, little by little, a satis- 
 factory knowledge of the means employed in 
 Charcoal Drawing and, from that A'ery knowl- 
 edge, you will be less embarrassed when you 
 draw from nature. But to make your copy- 
 ing profitable, it must be seriously studied 
 and your models should be chosen with great 
 care. 
 
 You should not copy from engravings nor 
 from old lithographs, for, says Allonge, 
 “These landscapes, however well sketched, 
 having the white paper for the sky, whether 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 69 
 
 gray, blue or white, make use of it again for 
 lights on a road, for foliage in sunlight, as 
 well as for the dull tone of tree trunks, the 
 lights of thatch or brick, the bright spots of 
 stone or plaster.” 
 
 We do not condemn these models alto- 
 gether ; there is good in every thing, but 
 you must know how to profit by it. The stu- 
 dent who does not know how to draw and 
 who wishes to succeed in Charcoal Drawing, 
 should work, outside of his special study, on 
 small copies in lead pencil, which will give 
 him facility of hand and render him more 
 skillful when he comes to treat Charcoal 
 Drawing with delicacy and to give careful 
 details. 
 
 You can begin by copying the landscape 
 drawing books, method Cassagne, but only 
 for first models ; for this method, excellent for 
 buildings, appears to us defective when you 
 come to trees. 
 
 If you are working for Charcoal Drawing, 
 
70 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 the particular study of the leaf is not useful ; 
 you should habituate yourself, as much as 
 possible, to treat trees by masses and by 
 effects and not by the detail of the foliage. 
 For this, you may copy some models from the 
 album of Hubert, taking care to add a 
 graded background for the sky. 
 
 Lately, many persons have copied in char- 
 coal photographs after nature ; this is very 
 bad. These photographs, made with care 
 and excellent guides for artists, since they 
 give the exact and minute form of the objects 
 reproduced, force the pupil into useless little 
 details and lead him away from a large inter- 
 pretation of nature. We may affirm this: 
 for the study of Charcoal Drawing there are 
 only two kinds of good models — reproduc- 
 tions of charcoal work by good methods, as 
 we have had lately, such as lithophotography 
 or heliography, or better still in Paris, the 
 Charcoal Drawings themselves, which you can 
 
STUDIES AIs'D LESSONS. 
 
 71 
 
 easily obtain either by hiring them or by sub- 
 scription. 
 
 This want of good models for drawing, 
 and particularly for Charcoal Drawing, will 
 soon be supplied, thanks to the intelligent en- 
 ergy of Messrs. Goupil & Co. Foreseeing 
 the important position which this kind of 
 artistic work will soon take, this house has 
 asked of M. Allonge a series of models which 
 will form a course of landscape drawing. 
 Nothing can be more practical or more com- 
 plete than this collection of designs, where it 
 would seem that the master has surpassed 
 himself. You will find in this course all the 
 examples and the teaching which is necessary 
 for study from nature. All is treated ; trees, 
 first planes, forests, river banks, mountains 
 and sea-views. And it is to be remarked 
 that, in this collection, each drawing, taken 
 separately, forms a real landscape, even in the 
 first of the series. 
 
 There are none of the dry elements and 
 
72 
 
 CHAKCOAL DEAWING. 
 
 principles of the old methods. The master 
 has undertaken to demonstrate his principles 
 by charming the student or the amateur ; and, 
 from the opinion of those who have seen the 
 originals, we can say that he has completely 
 attained the end which he proposed to him- 
 self. 
 
 The reproduction of these Charcoal Draw- 
 ings is a real marvel. We have shown the 
 proofs to several artists, and we can state that 
 the fac simile is so good that almost every 
 one of them has taken the reproduction for 
 a real Charcoal Drawing. 
 
 In conclusion, it is evident that this is 
 a great step made in the teaching of draw- 
 ing, and we hope that this result obtained 
 in the reproduction of Charcoal Drawings, 
 will facilitate the introduction of the study 
 into the public schools. 
 
 We advise the amateur to take the draw- 
 ings of M. Allonge as models and his man- 
 ner as their method, because his designs are 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 73 
 
 executed in so clear and neat a manner that, 
 by the time you have copied the second 
 drawing, you know the method of the ar- 
 tist. We do not say this because we are a 
 pupil of M. Allonge, on the contrary it was 
 because this was our opinion that we chose 
 him for a master. 
 
 When, after some months of study, you 
 have acquired the manner of working, in a 
 word the secret of Charcoal Drawing, you 
 may try it in every way. The drawings of 
 Appian and Lalanne ought to be taken at 
 the end of your studies. The works of these 
 two masters do not present themselves clearly 
 to the mind in the way of execution, and 
 in our opinion you must have all the talent 
 that they possess to arrive at such results 
 by such simple means. 
 
74 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 Copies after Painting. 
 
 The passage from copying to original 
 work is often difficult, and the student who, 
 by perseverance, has come to be a faithful 
 copyist, does not always succeed in giving 
 a satisfactory work from nature. Thus we 
 believe that it is an excellent transition 
 work to render a few oil paintings into char- 
 coal. If in such a picture the drawing is 
 clear, if the form is easy to reproduce, you 
 must still study for yourself the values 
 which the painter has rendered, values which 
 are the absolute bases of art. Moreover, 
 the execution of painting having nothing in 
 common with the method of Charcoal Draw- 
 ing, you can profit by your former work, 
 and learn gradually to take advantage of all 
 the methods in your power. 
 
i 
 

WRITTEN LESSONS. 
 
 LESSON FIEST. 
 
 SOUVENIE D’AUVEKS. 
 
 Now, reader, that you understand all the 
 accessories that you have to employ, we are 
 going to do our best to teach you the use 
 of them, by practicing together, if you are 
 willing. The first drawing that we submit 
 to you. Souvenir D’Auvers (PI. No. 2), is 
 simple in execution ; for that reason we have 
 chosen it for our first lesson.^ 
 
 * You can obtain in Paris, at the shop of M. G. 
 Meusnier, rue Neuve-Saint-Augiistin, No. 27, the plate 
 
 (75) 
 
76 
 
 CHAKCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 In the first j)lace, you must take the out- 
 side measure of your drawing, making four 
 lines, very light because they are not to re- 
 main; then, when you have the size of your 
 work, Avith your charcoal crayon cut or worn 
 flat and a little broad, pass a general tone 
 from left to right, beginning at the top, and 
 that in the most regular manner possible 
 and so that there shall remain no white 
 spaces between your touches in any direc- 
 tion. The paper once covered, by the aid of 
 your four fingers joined, or, better still (be- 
 cause this sky tone is very clear), by the help 
 of your rag, spread your charcoal, turning 
 from the right to the left and beginning at the 
 bottom, in order that the rag, gathering more 
 charcoal from the lower part, may leaAm }mu a 
 more vigorous tone at the top, Avhich Avill 
 
 (Souvenir d’Auvers) of the size of the original, about 
 14 X 11 inches, and also a collection of models and 
 progressive studies, either by hiring them or by sub- 
 scription. 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 77 
 
 make your sky fall back and give it the de- 
 sired perspective. You have thus your back- 
 ground, sky and water. With some bread- 
 crumb you must take off all that passes the 
 limits of your drawing, lines which should 
 already disappear under the work of the rag ; 
 then you must take the measure of your 
 drawing again, this time without making 
 lines, for nature has no outlines and Charcoal 
 Drawing permits you to give form only by 
 masses, shadows and lights. 
 
 On the background which you have already 
 laid, you make your sketch ; that is to say, 
 you mark your masses lightly to obtain their 
 position, which you must rectify until it is 
 very exact. For your first trials, take mea- 
 surements if you find them necessary; but, 
 when you have a little more practice, your 
 eye ought to guide you, and, to obtain the 
 position and size of your objects, you will 
 simply compare one with another. Thus, in 
 the design which we are studying, you see 
 
78 
 
 CHAECOAL DEAWING. 
 
 that the ground from the left to the right is 
 at about one-third of the whole height, start- 
 ing from the bottom of the drawing, and that 
 it grows gradually narrower toward the right; 
 you will indicate it by massing it with a flat 
 and vigorous tone. You mass, then, your 
 background much more lightly and rub it in 
 with the stomp. The first plane is a piece of 
 ground which is about half way between your 
 horizon and the bottom of your drawing ; you 
 mass it in the same manner as your ground in 
 your second plane, but less vigorously in 
 the upper part, and by passing your crayon 
 lightly over it, so as to obtain that grain 
 which you observe in your model. Then 
 you see that the middle of your drawing 
 is occupied by the group of willows which 
 are in the strongest shadow ; indicate this 
 group, observing that its width is about two- 
 thirds of its height, and place the little poplar 
 on the right, at its proper distance. 
 
 Then take the middle point between this 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 79 
 
 poplar and the right extremity of the draw- 
 ing, where you will place the group of poplars 
 in the background, and then draw all the de- 
 tails which are on the right and on the left 
 of this mass. After this, make the reflec- 
 tions in the water. And here we wish you to 
 notice that the general tone of the water is, 
 as in nature, a little more vigorous than the 
 tone of the sky; to obtain it, pass over, with 
 your crayon, a light tone which you will 
 spread with your finger. The reflections 
 ought to be sketched very perpendicular and 
 in a general vigorous tone. 
 
 Here is, then, the sketching out and the 
 putting in position of your drawing. Try to 
 be exact, especially in your first attempts, 
 otherwise you will come to content yourself 
 with b.eing nearly right, which is a fatal weak- 
 ness. It is very well, however, when you be- 
 gin, to mass a little under the model ; that is 
 to say, make your objects a little smaller, very 
 little, the tenth of an inch perhaps, in this 
 
80 
 
 CHAECOAL DEAWITO. 
 
 case, so that, afterwards, in working out the 
 details you may reach the exact measure of 
 your model ; otherwise you gain a little in 
 spite of yourself and make your object too 
 large. Your drawing then loses in elegance. 
 
 For the details in the execution, we pro- 
 ceed in the same order as for the sketching. 
 The sky is so simple that we need not en- 
 large upon it ; there is nothing to do but to 
 mark out the white spots forming clouds, with 
 bread-crumb. A light touch with the stomp 
 will indicate the little cloud at the top of the 
 drawing on the right. 
 
 Yext, we shall attack the ground on the 
 second plane, where we find the principal mo- 
 tif of the design, and for this we begin by 
 drawing the line of demarkation between the 
 land and the water ; speaking artistically, es- 
 tablish the vigors wdiich arrest the land at the 
 edge of the water. Then, if the general tone 
 is correct, draw with the crayon every vigor- 
 ous detail as exactly as possible and, with 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 81 
 
 bread-crumb already a little soiled, we lighten 
 the luminous parts of the half-tint. Take no- 
 tice that we say the bread-crumb ought to be 
 a little soiled ; this is important, otherwise we 
 shall have the same light as in the sky or on 
 the brilliant parts of the water. 
 
 The ground being finished, you will pro- 
 ceed with each detail upon it, drawing with 
 the crayon well sharpened and lighting them 
 up with the spill or with the stomp, taking 
 care that the vigorous details, fence, branches, 
 etc., be very clearly and carefully placed and 
 that the background be lighter than the 
 bright spots on the land itself. 
 
 The working of the group of willows in 
 the middle is very simple. It is made of two 
 vigorous tones lightened on each side by the 
 spills ; in the middle you may use the eraser 
 to take out some details of the leaf. 
 
 Here we may remark that, in employing 
 the eraser, it is convenient to hold it in a 
 particular manner. Let the handle of the 
 
82 
 
 CHAECOAL DRAWING. 
 
 eraser be under the hand, in such way that 
 you can perceive only the blade and the end 
 of fhe handle. This is the way it is held by 
 clerks Arhen they Avant to erase a large blot. 
 
 To return to our draAving ; take out Avith 
 bread-crumb the clean lights AAdiich separate 
 tlie branches of the tree on the right of the 
 group. This done, draAv the middle poplar 
 Amry perpendicular, in AAmrking up the char- 
 coal with a slender and close-tAvisted spill. 
 
 The poplars in the background on the 
 right, should be modeled AAntli the stomp or, 
 better still, you can indicate Avith it the gen- 
 eral mass Avell rubbed in and then cut out the 
 form or the profile Avith bread-crumb. Then 
 you may draw the ground on the first plane 
 as you did that on the left, taking care to 
 make it detach itself Avell from the Avater 
 which it divides ; but do this Avithout making 
 any lines, solely by the opposition of lights 
 and of Augors. 
 
 The drawing may be finished by the exe- 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 83 
 
 ciition of the water. Permit me, reader, to 
 repeat here what I said above; give great 
 care to your water, that is the great charm 
 of Charcoal Drawing. A Charcoal Draw- 
 ing without water is like “a book without 
 a preface or a man who goes out without a 
 hat;” consult a hundred amateurs, ninety-nine 
 wdll tell you that your drawing lacks some- 
 thing. Therefore you can not treat this ele- 
 ment of success with too much care. You 
 may employ every means to render the trans- 
 parency and the reflection, of the water ; paper 
 stomps, leather stomps, cork, wadding, etc. 
 Yothing, in our opinion, is better than the 
 pith of the elder, cut flat. In our drawing 
 you can spread the charcoal with the elder 
 pith very regularly, taking care that the 
 touches melt well together as if they were all 
 made with one single stroke. Then give the 
 vigors which reflect the masses in the shadow, 
 and by caressing the charcoal with the edge 
 of the eraser you have the half tints. 
 
84 
 
 CHAECOAL DEAWING. 
 
 Last of all, you will give the brilliant 
 touches of sunlight which just strike the sur- 
 face of the water, with the edge of a ball of 
 bread-crumb very carefully flattened. AVhen 
 your drawing is finished, set it as we have 
 shown you above. 
 
LESSON SECOND. 
 
 THE BKOOK (SOUVENIR OF NORMAN DY)"! 
 
 You may have remarked, in sketching the 
 first plate, that the backgrounds are worked 
 up at once with a spill or a paper stomp ; you 
 should proceed in the same way with the 
 brook. After having passed over your paper 
 a general tone for the sky with a rag covered 
 with charcoal dust, you must model the 
 poplars in the back ground with a spill, 
 first massing them very lightly with the 
 crayon ; then commence your positions at the 
 left, taking care to denote the very delicate 
 contours in the drawing. 
 
 The land, sketched as we have told you 
 
 *See frontispiece 
 
86 
 
 CHAECOAL DRAWING. 
 
 above, will then be worked up with the stomp 
 and retouched with bread-crumb on the road 
 that leads to the fence. The piece of ground 
 which forms the bank at the right, is rubbed 
 in only in spots and is modeled by the crayon 
 itself. The * water should be treated as in 
 the other study. You see that we can give 
 very few instructions on the manner of treat- 
 ing this second drawing, since every design 
 contains all the proceedings applied to Char- 
 coal Drawing. There is nothing to be found 
 here which we have not indicated above. It is 
 quite enough, then, for serious study, to copy 
 some good models and to notice well the 
 manner in which the artist avails himself of 
 his means. For this, the half-tint obtained by 
 the eraser is easily recognized ; let it be the 
 line of the water or a reed, its form is always 
 clear and distinct; the bread-crumb, on the 
 contrary, gives a broader and more brilliant 
 form ; and in the half-tints made by the spill, 
 you can obtain your lights with the leather 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 87 
 
 storap, if you wish, often less bright than 
 with the bread-crumb. 
 
 What we have just said, contradicts that 
 prejudice which many artists have against 
 Charcoal Drawing, which they say is only a 
 tissue of tricks. There are but few means ; 
 in this work we do not seek to hide the fact ; 
 but the artist must study seriously the mode 
 of employing them, if he wishes to give just 
 values, which is the basis of painting and 
 above all of landscape painting. 
 
GENSE AL , LESSON, 
 
 OE MANNER OF TREATING ANY SUBJECT. 
 
 There is no landscape, however extended 
 it may he, which embraces, in itself alone, 
 all that nature can present. Therefore, the 
 preceding lessons and the models chosen have 
 for their object only to designate the methods 
 employed for those different subjects. 
 
 If we had to explain the manner of rend- 
 ering every landscape, ten volumes and a hun- 
 dred plates would not be enough. 
 
 We shall try, in this chapter, to guide the 
 amateur and to give him the fullest instruc- 
 tions possible, so that, through whatever coun- 
 try he may travel, he will not be embarrassed 
 in filling his album with souvenirs. 
 
 ( 88 ) 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 89 
 
 The Sky. 
 
 If you have to render a blue and clear 
 sky, as in summer, treat it simply with the 
 rag, as we have described above; if it is of 
 an intense blue, as in winter in frosty weather, 
 work it up with the thumb or with the palm 
 of the hand, this will leave it the vigor it 
 ought to have. 
 
 Apropos to this, we find a very interesting 
 jiaragraph in the pamphlet of M. Armand 
 Charney, which is worth quoting: “If you 
 have a sky of clear blue or of luminous white, 
 be careful not to cover your paper with a uni- 
 form tint. The orientalists, who have brought 
 back to us landscapes resembling Chinese 
 shadows pasted on a background of uniform 
 blue, have fallen into a profound error in ima- 
 
90 
 
 CHAECOAL DEAWING. 
 
 gining that they can render thus the depth 
 and intensity of the southern skies. Decamps 
 and Delacroix have always avoided this 
 fault — they are observers too clear sighted to 
 fall into it. The purest sky is never uni- 
 form ; if you look at it fixedly, you will see 
 myriads of spots of a blue more or less deep, 
 which have the appearance of moving. It is 
 this resonance, this vibration of the light 
 which you should try to render; without it 
 there is no air, no space, no depth in the pic- 
 ture. A light tint rubbed over with cotton, 
 which you can work up by breaking it into 
 luminous points with bread-crumb, renders 
 very well the effect of which we have just 
 spoken, but you will be very far from succeed- 
 ing in this always. Therefore it is better to 
 choose generally cloudy skies, which exact 
 much less care and trouble.” 
 
 To render an effect of storm, a cloudy sky, 
 model your clouds with the stomp or the 
 leather, always in the direction in which they 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 91 
 
 are moving; lighten them with bread-crumb 
 if you wish to obtain those brilliant sunlight 
 effects which every-where gild the sky before 
 or after a storm. 
 
 But above all, let your tone of background 
 or of azure be always very smooth, and let 
 your clouds detach themselves well, that is 
 what will give depth and movement to your 
 sky. 
 
 The Water. 
 
 Water presents itself under many aspects ; 
 sleeping, as in a lake, a pool, etc., it always 
 reflects the objects which border it or which 
 are near to it. But the running water of riv- 
 ers does not always reflect these objects, or 
 else it presents their image in a thousand 
 different ways. 
 
 At sunrise the reflection is, so to say, flat 
 
92 
 
 CHAKCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 and without brilliancy. At noon, scarcely 
 any reflection ; the water is very brilliant, 
 sometimes it is even brighter than the sky. 
 
 It is in the evening, from four o’clock till 
 sunset, that water presents itself in the man- 
 ner most charming for the artist. The re- 
 flections then are clear and calm and repro- 
 duce objects as in a mirror, in all their values 
 and their varieties of tone. For this you 
 must use all the resources of Charcoal Draw- 
 ing — elder-pith, leather stomps, eraser; you 
 must avail yourself of them all if you wish 
 to succeed in rendering the variety of nature. 
 
 The Ground. 
 
 It is not, accurately speaking, the ground 
 itself which offers serious difficulties of exe- 
 cution, but what the soil bears : shrubs. 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 93 
 
 plants, rocks, etc. It is especially difficult to 
 carry these details over the ground so a. to 
 make them a part of it and cause you to feel 
 that the one produces the other. To succeed 
 in this, you must establish well the ground 
 tone of your soil, and for this take care not to 
 leave any of the white of the paper; you 
 should use that only when you want a bright 
 sunlight on a rocky ground ; for however 
 light grass and other details of the sort may 
 be, they are far from the brilliancy of sun- 
 light on a white house or on a stone. It is 
 well to be very moderate in the use of this 
 brilliant tone, which, when, employed, gives an 
 excellent result even when it exaggerates the 
 effect. 
 
94 
 
 CHAECOAL DRAWING. 
 
 The Trees. 
 
 One of the most troublesome tasks of the 
 amateur is the execution of foliage. And yet 
 it is very difficult to give absolute rules for 
 this work, for at a certain distance, such a 
 distance as that at which the student generally 
 places himself to get a view, the details of the 
 foliage disappear completely ; the masses 
 alone are visible. To know how to lighten 
 these masses and to maintain them on the 
 shadow, there the stud}^ of foliage ought to 
 end, and working^ after nature is really the 
 only means of acquiring that knowledge. It 
 is in the study of foliage above all that almost 
 all the methods of teaching known at this day 
 are defective. For, I repeat, unless you have 
 your tree completely in the foreground, you 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 95 
 
 should not occupy yourself with tae foliage, 
 and even in that case you should make its 
 quality felt only by the touch and not by 
 drawing it leaf by leaf. But if, on the second 
 plane, you wish to indicate the foliage in a 
 mass, either lightened or in half-tint, then the 
 eraser will be very useful to you, by employ- 
 ing it simply in the direction of the leaf, 
 which will give its form, and by bearing on 
 more or less forcibl}^, which will give you a 
 variety of lights that you can render more 
 brilliant with bread-crumb. 
 
 You may use also a paint-brush, more or 
 less moistened, or even dry, but this ought 
 to be employed only in great moderation. 
 This process, if it is not practiced with the 
 greatest skill, gives a monotonous stippling 
 which is not in harmony with the rest of the 
 drawing. 
 
96 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 Buildings 
 
 Offer no serious difficulty. You can easily 
 obtain their perspective by their relation to 
 the objects which surround them. There is 
 no need of making a special study of per- 
 spective. It is well, in general, to treat 
 buildings largely, and for that, close your 
 eyes slightly, so as to see only the salient 
 details. 
 
 Mountains. 
 
 The sharp and picturesque sites of Swit- 
 zerland and of the Pyrenees, so frequented 
 by tourists, are well suited to Charcoal 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 97 
 
 Drawing, because of the quickness with 
 which it seizes the effects always so fugitive 
 among mountains. You should distrust all 
 harsh lines in the treatment of such sub- 
 jects, above all in backgrounds where the 
 profiles of the mountains cross each other 
 on different planes. For the rest, mountains 
 ought to be treated with the same vigor and 
 with the same solidity as the ground. 
 
 The Rocks and the Sea ; the Sands. 
 
 Which of you, my readers, has not seen 
 those fine drawings of the sea-shore, by Al- 
 longe, the Souvenirs of Brittany, with their 
 dolmens and their men-hirs, in the midst 
 of that severe and almost savage nature ? 
 And those coasts of Yormandy, where the 
 master excels in rendering the low tide sands 
 when the water has gone out of sight? 
 
98 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 You may easily succeed in rendering the 
 sea-shore itself, but you need serious study 
 to render the atmosphere and its immensity, 
 and above all to vary your drawings from 
 nature. I need not repeat here that rocks 
 and cliffs should be solid and vigorous, but 
 there needs very different work for the sky, 
 the sea and the sand. The sea should gen- 
 erally be rendered by the paper stomp and 
 with a tolerably vigorous tone, the foam of 
 the waves by bread-crumb. The sand is to 
 be treated by the thumb or, if you Avish to 
 obtain the grain of the Avet sand lighted up 
 by the sun, here you may make use of that 
 process spoken of by various artists ; that 
 is, to draAv your charcoal crayon lightly over 
 your paper, so that the grain may catch the 
 friable particles of the charcoal, and let the 
 Avhite of the paper be seen betAveen the in- 
 terstices. 
 
 And now, reader, permit me to close this 
 chapter by recommending to you again A^ariety 
 
STUDIES ATs^D LESSONS. 
 
 99 
 
 in your work. This is an important point, 
 and for want of taking account of it, many 
 amateurs, artists even, fall into monotony 
 and uniformity, defects for which no genius 
 can compensate, especially in artistic work. 
 
SKETCHES IK CHAECOAL. 
 
 Sketches in charcoal ought to render only 
 effects. You make a sketch only when you 
 want to catch a passing effect, or when time 
 presses and does not permit you to make a 
 careful drawing from nature. Look at the 
 plate entitled Sunlight in the Woods. How 
 well Charcoal Drawing, even when rapidly 
 executed, can render this impression of na- 
 ture ! We can not undertake to show how 
 such sketches are made ; it is there espec- 
 ially that skill makes itself seen. In our 
 model, the background is a rough surface 
 smoothed over by the thumb, the ground 
 worked down by the stomp, then, the trees 
 once drawn and the masses put in place, the 
 ( 100 ) 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 101 
 
 artist obtained his sunlio-ht effects bv bread- 
 crumb. We believe that it would be very 
 useful, after having made serious studies 
 from nature, to make some of these sketches, 
 raj3idly drawn. In this way you can keep 
 a great number of impressions and remem- 
 brances of nature. 
 
ON EETOUCHING 
 AFTER THE FIXING OF THE DRAWING. 
 
 Charcoal Drawing is minute work from 
 this point of view, that it sometimes hap- 
 pens that, after having fixed your work, you 
 find it incomplete from want of vigor in the 
 first planes, or else it is too dry because you 
 have kept it on a scale of tones much too 
 dark. This latter trouble happens more fre- 
 quently than the former, because the fixative 
 always darkens the drawing perceptibly, and 
 if you make your general tone only slightly 
 vigorous, it is lost in blackness after the 
 fixing. To obviate this inconvenience, which, 
 however, will not present itself after some 
 ( 102 ) 
 
STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 103 
 
 study and practice, you may advantageously 
 use the rubber crayon, especially to lighten 
 the background. 
 
 If, on the other hand, the drawing fails 
 for want of solidity or of vigor, you can 
 repeat certain touches with a very black 
 charcoal crayon, such as the natural branch 
 or twig well charred, or even the black 
 crayon Conte. 
 
 These vigorous retouches made, you can 
 fix them by the help of the atomizer, or fix 
 the whole drawing again ; otherwise, if you 
 fix these touches only by the ordinary 
 means, the fixative laid on a second time 
 will form a circle over the first and make a 
 spot. 
 
 You may also work up a Charcoal Draw- 
 ing by means of gouache,^ of white crayons 
 or by some touches of oil, to obtain very 
 brilliant lights; but you should use these 
 
 * Gouache — water colors mixed with gum-water. 
 
104 
 
 CHAECOAL DKAWING. 
 
 means very scrupulously. If you employ 
 oil colors, mix a little cadmium or yellow 
 ochre with the silver white, which will give a 
 tone at once warm and very luminous. If 
 you have been so imprudent as to make a 
 sketch without having prepared your sky tone, 
 you may still obtain it, even after fixing your 
 work, by the help of your linen roll dipped 
 into charcoal dust, which you can pass lightly 
 over your drawing. This will not give a 
 great delicacy, but it will take away the 
 crudity of the drawing, especially if it is 
 made on white paper. 
 
STUDY FEOM NATURE 
 

STUDY FROM NATURE. 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 It is now, reader, that you must endeavor 
 to he yourself and try to make yourself origi- 
 nal. For that, forget, before nature, what 
 you have copied ; do not try to draw like this 
 or that artist, but simply draw what you see. 
 
 The manner of working alone ought to re- 
 main with you, so that, your motif ohqq chosen, 
 the execution will not embarrass you. 
 
 The first time that you work from nature, 
 
 ( 107 ) 
 
108 
 
 CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 choose a quiet subject, the corner of a wood, a 
 glimpse of a river or of a field. Avoid 
 space, extent, in a word all complex landscape. 
 That will come later, but take care not to go 
 too quickly. I know very well that the great 
 desire of an amateur, when he goes to the 
 countiy, is to bring back complete little land- 
 scapes, which can be framed. But, I repeat 
 it, a little patience, and instead of having 
 a gallery of your works you will have, it is 
 true, only a few drawings, but these will easily 
 find their admirers. 
 
 The first studies ought to be studies of 
 trees ; the tree, it has been said, is the acad- 
 emy of landscape ; nothing is more true, and 
 he who knows how to draw a tree well, that is 
 to say, to construct it well and to lighten u|3 
 its masses, will find no difficulty when he 
 attempts a whole landscape. Water, sky, 
 buildings, all present their difficulties it is true, 
 but the tree is and always will be the serious 
 difficulty in landscape, since it is the study 
 
STUDY FROM NATURE. 
 
 109 
 
 which gives back the least result from skill 
 in work or from good methods. A few build- 
 ings drawn with care, you have them all ; a 
 few borders of the water carefully studied, 
 your waters will always be transparent, and 
 your skies will leave nothing to desire if you 
 begin by treating them simply. 
 
 But every tree bears in itself its mark 
 of originality ; the oak has a thousand ways 
 of being broad and powerful ; the supple 
 and elegant poplar, the willow, the elm, the 
 aspen, the plane-tree change, a thousand 
 times, their form and aspect, from one sea- 
 son to another. Therefore they must be 
 studied with the greatest care ; watch them 
 even when they put on certain bizarre forms, 
 if you wish to understand them well, and 
 never forget that you must always build up 
 your tree, no matter how lightly, before 
 marking out its masses, or putting in its ef- 
 fects. In recalling your last lesson, you will 
 remember that each object ought to be ren- 
 
110 
 
 CHAUCOAL DEAWIXG. 
 
 dered differently, this ahv£iys happens in 
 nature. The trees themselves on^ht to he 
 treated after their kind. Kender the willow 
 h}^ light rubbings ; the oak with vigorous, 
 nay, brutal, masses ; the poplar with energy 
 in touch, for it is a tree of strong tonality, 
 but give to this touch the delicacy and the 
 suppleness which characterize the poplar. 
 
 I will not go back upon each detail. 
 Try above all to make your drawing har- 
 monize in all its parts, and after some 
 months of study from nature, you will ar- 
 rive at the best results, as I promised you 
 in the beginning of this book ; nay more, 
 at better results than you can have hoped 
 for in the beginning. 
 
 Here, dear reader, is the summing up 
 of all the instruction that I have received 
 and that I transmit to you. May it make 
 of you what it has made of me, an amateur, 
 a lover and an admirer oh Charcoal Draw- 
 ing and of its artists. 
 
 O 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 Pages. 
 
 Translatob-’s Preface, . . . . . . 7 
 
 Preface, . . . . . . _ . . . 9 
 
 ORIGI^^ OF CHARCOAL DRAWING. 
 
 Charcoal -applied to the human figure, .... 15 
 
 Charcoal applied to landscape, ‘ . . , . 20 
 
 FURNITURE OF THE ATELIER. 
 
 Of the Material of the Atelier, 33 
 
 The Easel, . . . . . • . . . ' . 34 
 
 The Frame, .......... 37 
 
 The Stretcher, ........ 40 
 
 The Charcoal Crayons, . 42 
 
 The Paper, 45 
 
 Stomps, Spills, Punk, Wadding, Linen or Woolen Rags, 
 
 Elder Pith, the Employment and the Preservation 
 
 of Bread-Crumb, 49 
 
 The Rag, 51 
 
 (111) 
 
112 
 
 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 The Bread-Crumb, 53 
 
 The Eraser, 54 
 
 The Fixative, ......... 55 
 
 Of the Material for Country Work, .... 60 
 
 STUDIES AND LESSONS. 
 
 Pages. 
 
 Study after the masters. The choice of models, . . 67 
 
 Copies from paintings, ..... 74 
 
 Written lessons, 75 
 
 Lesson first, . 75 
 
 Lesson second, 85 
 
 General lesson, ...... 88 
 
 The Sky, 89 
 
 The Water, ........ 91 
 
 The Ground, 92 
 
 Trees, 94 
 
 Buildings, 96 
 
 Mountains, ........ 96 
 
 The Rocks and the Sea ; The Land, ... 97 
 
 Sketches in Charcoal, ...... 100 
 
 Of Retouches after the fixing of the drawing, . . 102 
 
 Study from nature, . . . i . . 104 
 
“Lovers of art will be Interested in every page. It would 
 be difficult to see how the field could be covered more satis- 
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 Inter’- Ocean, 
 
 THE ART AMATEUR. 
 
 A Profusely Illustrnied Monthly Journal Devoted to 
 the Lultivatio7i of 
 
 ART IN THE HOUSEHOLD. 
 
 
 
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 be continued. Among these are : 
 
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 11. Answers to Correspondents on all subjects connected with Art. 
 
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 No. lo East Fourteenth St.., Neiv Fork,. 
 

 Amewcaw Apt Review 
 
 A JOURNAL DEVOTED TO THE PRACTICE, THEORY, 
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 WM. C. PRIME, LL.D., New York, 
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 Gen. L. P. DiCesnola, Secretary and Director of the Metroiiolitau Museum 
 of Art, New York: Mrs. Ednaii D. Cheney. Boston; Mr. MTlliaai J. 
 Clark, dr., Philadelphia; Mrs. C. E. Clement, Boston; Mr. Clarenck 
 Cook, New York; Mr. George Corliss, Secretary of the i’enn-ylvania. 
 Academy of Fine Aris, Philadelphia; Mr. Thomas Davidson, Boston; 
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 Austrian Mu-eumof Artaud Industry. Vienna. Austria; IMr.E.H. Green- 
 EEAF, Curator or the Gray Collection of Engravings, Boston ; iVIr. Charles 
 Henry Hart, Philadelphia ; Mr. W. R. Hodges, St. Louis; Prof. Hal- 
 sey C. Ives, Director of St. Louis School of Fine Arts, Washington 
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 Laffan, New York; IMr. George McLaughlin, Cincinnati; Dr. Al- 
 fred C. Lambdin, Philadelphia; Mr. G. P. Lathrop. Boston; Mr. W. 
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 Loring, Curator of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; ISIr. William 
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 Charles H. Moore. Harvard University. Cambridge; P'Ot. Charles 
 E. Norton. Harvard University. Cambridge; IMr. Wili.iam R. O'Dono- 
 VAN, New York; Mr. Theodore G. I’inches. British Museum. Loudon : 
 Maj. J. W. I’OWELI.. Geographical and Geological SurA'ev of the Rocky 
 Mountain Region, Washington; Mrs. Maugaret J. Preston. I.e-xing- 
 ton, Virginia; Piof. F.W. Putnam. Curator of the Pealiody Museum of 
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 Mr. John Sartin, Philadelphia; Prof. AValter Smith, State Director 
 of Art Education, Mussachusetts; Dr. J. M. Sommerville. Philadelphia; 
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 AVashington; Mr. AV. T. Stillman. Florence. Italy; Prof. Russell 
 Sturgis, New York College, New York; Mr. J. R. Tait. Baltimore: Air. 
 Henry van Brunt. Boston; Air. F. P. Vinton, Boston; Air. H. Dumont 
 AVagner. Philadelphia; Prof. AA’"illiam R. AA'are. Alas^sachusetts Insti- 
 tute of Technology. Boston; .Mr. H. C- AViiiPPLE. Curator of the Phillips 
 •Collectio I of Engravings. Philadelphia; Air. AV. H. Whitmore, Boston; 
 Mr. P. B. AVigiit, Chicago. 
 
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