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over-red, or worse, too yellow, by the propinquity of violet. Some mauves are more delicate even than lavender, but others destroy the bloom of the skin. Hardly one woman in ten knows-or even considers -in selecting colours, their properties in those respects. Indeed, when a woman habitually looks well, it is almost always because she is too pretty to be spoiled; scarcely ever because she is 'wise in her generation,' as to the artistic selection or arrangement of the colours employed in her attire.

The chief blues used by artists are indigo, Prussian, Antwerp, cobalt, and ultramarine. Prussian blue is the most powerful of the five, the smallest scrap being sufficient to make a bright blue when mixed with white. This is also identical with the blue used by laundresses. In painting, what we now call violet, which we have only recently brought to a dazzling perfection, and made a 'fast' colour (violet twenty years ago was a miserably dull hue and extremely fugitive), can be produced by a judicious admixture of the finest blue with crimson lake or madder. Cobalt and rose-madder will make violet; but no common red mixed with any common blue makes violet at all. Chambers's Encyclopædia' is very misleading when it says that the admixture of pure red and pure blue will form this colour; and when Redgrave announces that violet is produced by 'five red and eight

blue,' we are not very much wiser. Crimson or a blue red is the only red admissible, and the finest and rarest blue is indispensable to form anything approaching the bright violet we now so much value. Opaque reds are useless, and so is Prussian blue. Indeed, until the discovery of the two exquisite colours magenta and mauve in the coal tar about 1857, we did not really know what violet was. (It is a curious fact that the aniline colours are the only ones that will not mix harmoniously with any others. When introduced in a pattern or mass they always stand aloof, as it were, like members of an alien tribe that refuse to hold any intercourse with strangers.)1

A very beautiful blue, little inferior to ultramarine, is said to have been extracted by Elizabeth Rowe from the cyanus, or corn-flower, whose colour is so deep and transparent an azure that it has taken its name, some say from the Greek kúavos, blue. Others suppose it to have been called after the nymph Cyane, who played with Persephone in the fields of Sicily before Pluto carried her away. But as Persephone was enchanted by

This is almost universally true. In even the Oriental carpets and fabrics we can at once see how the mixture of these European colours ruins the harmony of all the other colours. But we have seen a Turkish embroidered cloth in which both magenta and modern violet have been introduced with the happiest results. This is, however, a remarkable.

exception.

a daffodil, and as daffodils belong to April while the cyanus never appears until August, we think the latter derivation a failure.

Green.

From blue to green is a natural transition, and I am rejoiced to tell my younger readers that the dark sage green, which has become so fashionable during the last few years, although often in the London climate looking so gloomy as to be scarcely distinguishable from black, is an exceedingly becoming colour, and has a fine effect in combination with other colours. It is becoming in itself, because it annuls any tinge of green which may be latent in the complexion, and which, in dark persons, is often more obtrusive than the owners are aware of. The most sallow woman would be indignant at a hint of this, and generally contrives to defy herself by wearing the very colours which increase the defect. Fair persons are also frequently improved by this dingy green, when a pale green would make them look corpse-like.

Sage-green mixes beautifully with salmon-colour; both are most perfect colours to set off a pallid dark complexion. Sage-green also goes well with deep lake, with primrose, and with dull or greenish blues. In the

decoration of rooms it may be largely used, on account of its being so good a background. It is a less sharp contrast with surrounding colours than black, and in a pattern will go well with almost everything. It is appro priate for doors and shutters, especially when relieved with gold. For ceilings it is generally too dark.

There are some bright greens which are becoming to the face, but only a few shades. I say bright in contradistinction to sage. A dull grass-green with a slight yellow tinge in it is a picturesque colour, and often proves a success in a woollen day-dress-some material, that is to say, without gloss. In silks or satins it is nearly as coarse and unpleasant as a pure bright green, innocent of any hint of blue or yellow; and when worn, as hundreds of women persist in wearing it, with a mass of scarlet, is so horrible as to give positive pain to a sensitive eye. In any concert-room or large assemblage a scarlet opera-cloak usually covers a green dress, and is capped by a green bow in the hair. One may count these mistakes by the dozen, and they arise from the generally diffused milliners' creed, that scarlet and emerald must go hand in hand, because green and red are complementaries. The vulgarity and disagreeableness of this mixture ought to be apparent to anybody with the very rudiments of artistic feeling.

Green is often mentioned in medieval poems as a

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favourite colour for dress for both men and women. The beautiful 'Rosial' (in the Court of Love,' attributed to Chaucer) is robed in a green gown, 'light and summerwise, shapen full well,' with rubies around her neck; but, as we have often explained, antique colours as a rule were very much less brilliant than modern ones, and rubies are very far from being scarlet. A dull yellow green and dark crimson are a fine mixture.

The

Pale green, so trying to the majority of faces, is, in some cases, a pretty ornament, and may be mixed craftily with pale blue in a most charming manner. dress offered to Enid, 'where like a shoaling sea the lovely blue played into green,' is one of Tennyson's happiest thoughts. It requires, however, taste to do this well; and, alone, pale green is better shunned by the inexperienced, unless they be blest with. complexions so beautiful that they will survive any ill-treatment.

ned.

The reds admissible in close proximity to the face must be arranged with caution. The red in the face is usually easy to extinguish; while persons who are very florid must be even more careful what reds they use than the pale people.

Pink I need not say much about. It is suitable to

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