In an old MS. at the British Museum, the human form is most oddly contorted into grotesque semblances of capital letters. An initial for a paper on war may be composed of armor, weapons, &c.
Fig. 3, an S, is suitable for a heroic poem, or romantic tale of chivalry. For agriculture, we form our initial of corn, or the implements of husbandry, and such like; for music, of musical instruments and characteristic ornaments.
The S in the annexed cut is of silver, burnished and wrought (terms which we shall presently explain); the flag is painted in ultramarine, and striped and bordered with silver the spear-headed staff is shaded with Vandyke brown, and its decorations put in with silver.
Fig. 3.
Fig. 4.
Fig. 4 is not an allegorical letter, but simply decorative, and adapted for a title-page, rather than an initial. The darker and central parts of the letter are of vermilion, shaded with carmine; and the ornamentation of gold burnished and wrought. The letter in Fig. 5 belongs to the same class, and is only a modification of style; the white ground is merely shaded up with soft touches of carmine. The varieties of letters which can be formed are endless, and may be as quaint and as ideal as fancy can devise, provided they are also appropriate, and do not depart from the gracefully-curved line of beauty.
Fig. 5.