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giving a solid brilliance to the colours. I have used it to dilute the colours on my Palette with the knife; but diluted with Poppy oil or very little Spirits of Turpentine it may be used with the brush. The Pigments should not be ground with this oil, but (being ground with Linseed or Poppy oil) should be tempered with it at the time of use. It may be used to thin any of the tints being itself diluted with poppy oil, for the first sketching, with Spirits of Turpentine, as any other drying oil.

Progressive Improvement.
 
The discoveries & improvements in art & science have always been progressive. The mind of man, so capable of vast acquirements, is only expanded through successive acquisitions, slowly, from time to time; the discoveries of one man, or one age, being transmitted to another, serve as a foundation for improvements, & further developments of knowledge. Chance also has its share in these operations, and favorable situations & circumstances likewise promote the progress. Thus Italy, the seat of many successive volcanic irruptions, possesses in her soil a variety of coloured Earths which afforded facilities to the Painter, and led him to further researches, through her scientific knowledge & her extensive commerce. There can be no doubt that something of the style of colouring which distinguished the Painters of Siena, & consequently of Florence, was owing to the rich hues of the Terra di Siena; that the bright Neapolitan style was induced & confirmed by her manufacture of Naples Yellow; and that the profusion of Lapis Lazuli at Rome, where alone Ultramarine was made, influenced the Roman Painters in their Blue draperies with the deep contrast of Red.
  
Durability of Colours.
 
It was in the year 1790 that John Beale Bordley, of Maryland, who was the first to patronize Charles W. Peale, in the year 1773, agreed to sit for another Portrait, on condition that the Painter would use none but mineral colours, & avoid especially those which he had learned to use under the instruction of Mr. West in London - and that he should use no black, which he said was the Devil's colour. - And it was in the year 1796 that Gilbert Stuart was induced by C.W. Peale's experience & recommendation, (in my presence), to abandon Mr. West's Palette, in which his shadow tints, composed of Lake, brown Pink and Prussian Blue, turned green by the fading of the Lake, before the rediscovery of Madder Lake. Ultramarine, raw Siena & Madder Lake now compose better neutral tints - especially for Landscape.