Saucers.
Saucers, 2 inches in diameter, should be procured for the red and blue powder colours. A smaller saucer, 1 inch in diameter, for Bessemer's gold, will prevent much waste, and another for Chinese white would be useful. Price 1d. each, or less.
Compound Red.
In proceeding to illuminate the scroll, place a little vermilion-powder, and quite twice as much carmine, in a saucer, with a drop or two of thick gum-water; mix it well with a brush, adding water as required.[10] Stir the paint up now and then during use, as the vermilion has a tendency to sink.
German Blue.
German blue, as already mentioned, must be mixed with a good proportion of gum-water, stirred well into the powder: it is best to mix a little at a time, say half a teaspoonful of the powder, as it hardens, and becomes more troublesome to use. This blue, prepared as a moist colour, would be most valuable for illuminating, if it did not lose its opacity.
Succession of Colours.
Paint all the black in the scroll first, the red next, and, if German blue, blue last, as, with every precaution, it is apt to rub—in which case, remove the blemishes with crumbs of bread. If the text should consist of two lines, finish the upper one first (all but the gold), to prevent injury to the lower one by rubbing. Fresh water should be provided for each colour, in order to preserve its brightness.
Bessemer's gold paint may be applied last of all, but leaf-gold should be laid on before any colour.
The following remarks on the subject of ancient illuminations are valuable, having been made by Mr. Ruskin at a meeting of the Society of Antiquaries, held on the 6th of June, 1861. He observed that the best designs were contrived so as to give the greatest effect to arrangements of pure and beautiful colour. He explained the excellence of the best specimens as arising from simplicity of design and colour—the latter being left wholly unclouded by shade. He did not deny the high excellence of the naturalistic treatments in the illuminations of the 15th and 16th centuries and later—but he viewed illumination in this condition as fallen into decay, and by the introduction of shading was effected the final destruction of what had constituted its essential principles and glory in the 13th century.