[159] In his lecture on "the distinction between illumination and painting," being the first of a series on Decorative Color delivered at the Architectural Museum, Cannon Street, Westminster, Mr. Ruskin is reported (Builder, Nov. 25, 1854) to have said, "The line which is given by Cary, 'which they of Paris call the limner's skill,' is not properly translated. The word, which in the original is 'alluminare,' does not mean the limner's art, but the art of the illuminator—the writer and illuminator of books." In criticism of this remark, "M. A.," writing to the Builder from Cambridge, defended Cary's translation by referring to Johnson's dictionary to show that "limner" was after all corrupted from "enlumineur," i.e., "a decorator of books with initial pictures." His letter concluded by remarking upon another of Mr. Ruskin's statements in the same lecture, namely, that "Black letter is not really illegible, it is only that we are not accustomed to it.... The fact is, no kind of character is really illegible. If you wish to see real illegibility, go to the Houses of Parliament and look at the inscriptions there!"

The present letter was written in reply to "M. A.," from whom the latter portion of it elicited a further letter, together with one from "Vindex," in defence of Sir Charles Barry and the Houses of Parliament (see the Builder, Dec. 16, 1854).

[160] "It is generally better to read ten lines of any poet in the original language, however painfully, than ten cantos of a translation. But an exception may be made in favor of Cary's 'Dante.' If no poet ever was liable to lose more in translation, none was ever so carefully translated; and I hardly know whether most to admire the rigid fidelity, or the sweet and solemn harmony, of Cary's verse," etc. See the note to the "Stones of Venice," at the above-named page.

[From the "Transactions of the New Shakspere Society" for 1878-9, pp. 409-12.]
NOTES ON A WORD IN SHAKESPEARE.[161]

"And yon gray lines
That fret the clouds are messengers of day."

Julius Cæsar, II. i. 103-4.

I.
Brantwood, Coniston, Lancashire.

My dear Furnivall: Of course, in any great writer's word, the question is far less what the word came from, than where it has come to. Fret means all manner of things in that place; primarily, the rippling of clouds—as sea by wind; secondarily, the breaking it asunder for light to come through. It implies a certain degree of vexation—some dissolution—much order, and extreme beauty. I have myself used this word substantively, to express the rippled edge of a wing-feather. In architecture and jewellery it means simply roughening in a decorative manner.[162]

Ever affectionately yours,
J. Ruskin.