The mastery of the three primary colors—yellow, red, and blue—is the Alpha and Omega of painting. As force of color is only to be obtained by opposing one of these singly to all the others combined, they are consequently all present whenever opposition occurs; and no picture is perfectly pleasing without the presence of all three, even though they may be subdued to the most solemn and sober undertones. Try the effect of mixing the various colors, and preserve the mixtures you find most useful. But this is an art which must be learned, and for the elucidation of which we have no space here.
[X.]
LAWN TENNIS.
And now we come to what, perhaps, our readers may imagine we might have come to before—the out-of-door Games and Amusements which radiate from Home.
Lawn Tennis is so preëminently the game of the present moment that we must give it a central place in our volume.
It has great antiquity, of course. What fashionable game has not? Did not Agrippina play at croquet, and Cleopatra institute “Les Graces”? We know that Diana started archery, for isn’t she always drawn with a bow? And yet she died an old maid.
The Greeks styled court tennis as “Sphairistike,” and the Romans called it Pila. It was the fashionable pastime of French and English kings. Charles V, of France, and Henry V, VII, and VIII, of England, were all good tennis players. Who does not remember the insult which the French king put upon royal Harry?
“Tennis balls! My lord?”