Now in the bud, where all these proceedings...

§ 23. Now if we inclose Fig. 1. in Plate 8. with two curves passing through the extremities of the ribs, we get Fig. 2., the central type of all leaves. Only this type is modified of course in a thousand ways by the life of the plant. If it be marsh or aquatic, instead of springing out in twigs, it is almost certain to expand in soft currents, as the liberated stream does at its mouth into the ocean, Fig. 3. (Alisma Plantago); if it be meant for one of the crowned and lovely trees of the earth, it will separate into stars, and each ray of the leaf will form a ray of light in the crown, Fig. 5. (Horsechestnut); and if it be a commonplace tree, rather prudent and practical than imaginative, it will not expand all at once, but throw out the ribs every now and then along the central rib, like a merchant taking his occasional and restricted holiday, Fig. 4. (Elm). decorative paintings
§ 24. Now in the bud, where all these proceedings on the leaf's part are first imagined, the young leaf is generally (always?) doubled up in embryo, so as to present the profile of the half-leaves, as Fig. 7., only in exquisite complexity of arrangement; Fig. 9., for instance, is the profile of the leaf-bud of a rose. Hence the general arrangement of line represented by Fig. 8. (in which the lower line is slightly curved to express the bending life in the spine) is everlastingly typical of the expanding powers of joyful vegetative youth; and it is of all simple forms the most exquisitely delightful to the human mind. It presents itself in a thousand different proportions and variations in the buds and profiles of leaves; those being always the loveliest in which, either by accidental perspective of position, or inherent character in the tree, it is most frequently presented to the eye. The branch of bramble, for instance, Fig. 10. at the bottom of Plate 8., owes its chief beauty to the perpetual recurrence of this typical form; and we shall find presently the enormous importance of it, even in mountain ranges, though, in these, falling force takes the place of vitalforce. original oil paintings

Fig. 3.

§ 25. This abstract conclusion the great thirteenth century artists were the first to arrive at; and whereas, before their time, ornament had been constantly refined into intricate and subdivided symmetries, they were content with this simple form as the termination of its most important features. Fig. 3., which is a scroll out of a Psalter executed in the latter half of the thirteenth century, is a sufficient example of a practice at that time absolutely universal. cheap oil paintings

9.Botany of the 14^th Century.
From the Prayer-book of Yolande of Navarre.

§ 26. The second great discovery of the Middle Ages in floral ornament, was that, in order completely to express the law of subordination among the leaf-ribs, two ribs were necessary,and no more, on each side of the leaf, forming a series of three with the central one, because proportion is between three terms at least.

Fig. 4.

That is to say, when they had only three ribs altogether, asa, Fig. 4., no law of relation was discernible between the ribs, or the leaflets they bore; but by the addition of a third on each side as at b, proportion instantly was expressible, whether arithmetical or geometrical, or of any other kind. Hence the adoption of forms more or less approximating to that at c(young ivy), or d (wild geranium), as the favorite elements of their floral ornament, those leaves being in their disposition of masses, the simplest which can express a perfect law of proportion, just as the outline Fig. 7. Plate 8. is the simplest which can express a perfect law of growth. oil painting reproductions

Plate 9. opposite gives, in rude outline, the arrangement of the border of one of the pages of a missal in my own possession, executed for the Countess Yolande of Flanders, in the latter half of the fourteenth century, and furnishing, in exhaustless variety, the most graceful examples I have ever seen of the favorite decoration at the period, commonly now known as the "Ivy leaf" pattern.