Here the _intensity_ is confined within the simile and the colour scheme; the intervening space corresponds to the background of a picture, while the final short sentence, purposely dulled, is the _reaction_. Evidently (and all the more so as I have chosen a pictorial effect) an analogous intensity could be obtained in a painting; the flower patches could be exaggerated in colour to the uttermost limit of the palette, while the reagent final sentence was figured by a filmy treatment of the atmosphere. The limit to _intensity_ is the _key_ in which the work is conceived. But the word _key_ must not be taken in its purely musical sense; obviously, within the same piece the governing motif must not be andante at the beginning and presto at the end, but in artistic generalisations it must be taken as the spirit that informs rather than as the technical rule which controls. Thus, in literature, the _key_ is the attitude of the writer: if in one part of the book his thought recalls Thackeray and in another Paul de Kock the _key_ has been changed; and again if the left side of the picture is pointillist, the right side cubist, the _key_ has been changed. I choose exaggerated, almost absurd instances to make the point clear; in practice, when the writer, the musician, or the painter appears to have seen consistently, the key he has worked in is steadfast. It should be said that uniformity of _key_ does not imply absence of _reaction_; there is room, while the _key_ remains uniform, for the juxtaposition of burlesque and romance, just as there is room in Holbein's 'Ambassadors' for the incomprehensible object in the foreground, said to embody a pun (Hohl Bein). But the _key_ needs to be kept in mind as its maximum expression is the _culmination_ of the effect. The _culmination_ of a speech is in its peroration; of a poem in its incorporated envoi. Thus in the _Arab Love Song_, the culmination is:-- 'And thou what needest with thy tribe's black tents Who hast the red pavilion of my heart?' There is no difficulty there. But in painting the _culmination_ is more subtle. It consists in the isolation of the chief object. Say that we have from left to right: Black, yellow, dark brown, light blue, dark red; then add on the extreme right, crimson, then gold. The picture _culminates_ on the extreme right, with the result that attention is directed there and that any object in that section of the picture benefits by an influence about equivalent to that of footlights. _Culmination_, involves the painter in great difficulties, for there must be _culmination_, while an effect in the wrong place may destroy the _balance_ of his work. This appertains to