A small piece of charcoal. Burnt grape-vine or cedar makes the best.
A piece of transparent tracing-paper. A black lead-pencil.
Pen and ink.
A thick pasteboard, or thin pine board, about the thickness of an ordinary book-cover, and at least two inches longer and wider than the picture you are about to make. A sheet of glass will answer as well, perhaps better.
A small quantity of thin, fine paste, free from lumps, made of flour and water boiled. Mind that it is boiled and free from lumps.
Now see the diagram No. 1. This is the picture you wish to produce in the transparency. Take your tracing-paper, and with a pen and ink make an outline of this picture, having done which, rub the charcoal over the back of the tracing, then lay the tracing-paper on a sheet of letter-paper, take your lead-pencil in your hand; now, every mark you make on the tracing-paper with the pencil will leave a corresponding charcoal mark on the paper beneath it. Bearing this in mind, you will draw your pencil carefully round the outline of the moon, the window of the old castle, and the bright light in the water. Now carefully remove the tracing-paper, and you will find the forms of these objects faintly marked in charcoal lines on the writing-paper. Now, with the fine point (it must have a fine point) of your lead-pencil, travel over the charcoal lines, so as to make them distinct and permanent. You do so because the charcoal easily brushes off. You will then proceed to brush off the charcoal with a soft rag as soon as you have made your pencil outline. You will now, with the scissors or penknife, whichever is most convenient for the purpose, cut out the parts you have traced—that is to say, a round hole for the moon, a small square patch for the castle window, and a few irregular slits for the water. Then you will have a piece of paper like diagram No. 2 (page 152).
There now, we think we managed to keep the white fingers out of that pretty well, though it was pretty hard work, rest assured. So far so good. Now you want to cut a piece of paper, which shall be your second tint, to represent the clouds and water. To this end you again lay your outline tracing on the white paper, and trace the shape of the clouds, the castle window, and the lights on the water, which will give you a form similar to that represented in diagram No. 3 (page 153). This you will cut out as before.
Now you wish for a tint to represent the distant mountains and the reflection of the old castle; therefore, trace and cut out as before directed a piece of paper corresponding with the outlines of these forms, which piece will correspond exactly with diagram No. 4 (page 154). Now you will cut out a piece of paper to represent the nearer mountains and the castle, which will correspond with diagram No. 5 (page 155). After which you will cut a piece to represent the castle alone; and lastly, you cut out of your card the form of the fir-tree and old railing in the foreground, and the chief part of your labor is done.
Again we must congratulate ourself on keeping those little fingers out of our description, though they have been playing about like white mice among our ideas all the time. We only trust we have made the process clear to our readers.
We will now presume you wish to mount your transparency on a sheet of glass. First take the piece of white paper corresponding with diagram No. 2, and cover it with a thin coat of paste, being careful that it is free from lumps, and lay it on the glass, pressing it evenly all over with a soft handkerchief. Over this, in its proper place, paste No. 3, over that No. 4, and so on, one over the other, till they are all on. You can now hold it up to the light to see if the reflected lights in the water are correct; if not, wait till the transparency is dry, and brighten them up by cutting the necessary pieces out with the sharp point of a penknife. All that needs doing now is to paste over all a thin sheet of white paper. This need only be pasted round the edges just enough to make it keep its place. To give the picture a finish, it should either be put in a frame or have a border of gilt paper or other untranslucent material pasted round it to conceal the ragged edges of the picture. Now your picture is complete. Hold it once more up to the light, and you will be surprised what a beautiful effect is produced.