Mr. Landseer, at pages 175, 176, of his Lectures on Engraving, makes the following remarks on the term “colour,” as conventionally applied by engravers in speaking of impressions from plates or from wood-blocks:--“It is not uncommon among print-publishers, nor even amongst engravers themselves, to hear the word COLOUR mistakenly employed to signify _shade_; so that if they think an engraving too dark, they say it has too much _colour_, too little colour if too light--and so forth. The same ignorance which has hitherto reigned over the pursuits of this Art, has here imposed its authority, and with the same unfortunate success: I cannot however yield to it the same submission, since it is not only a palpable misuse of a word, but would lead to endless confusion when I come to explain to you my ideas of the means the Art of engraving possesses of rendering local colour in the abstract. Wherefore, whenever I may use the term _colour_, I mean it in no other than its ordinary acceptation.” “By MIDDLE TINT, I understand and mean, ‘the medium between strong light and strong shade.’--These are Mr. Gilpin’s words; and he adds, with a propriety that confers value on the definition--‘the phrase is _not at all_ expressive of colour.’” Whether we owe the term “colour,” as applied to engravings, to the ignorance of printsellers or not, I shall not inquire; I only know that a number of terms equally objectionable, if their primitive meaning be considered, are used in speaking of the arts of painting and engraving by persons who are certainly not ignorant. We have the words _high_ and _deep_, which strictly relate to objects of lineal altitude or profundity, applied to denote intensity of colour; and the very word _intensity_, when thus applied, is only relative; the speaker being unable to find a word directly expressive of his meaning, explains himself by referring to some object or thing previously known, as, in this instance, by reference to the _tension_ of a string or cord. The word _tone_, which is so frequently used in speaking of pictures, is derived from the sister art of music. I presume that none of these terms were introduced into the nomenclature of painting and engraving by ignorant persons, but that they were adopted from a necessity originating from the very constitution of the human mind. It is well known to every person who has paid any attention to the construction of languages, that almost every abstract term is referable to, and derived from, the name of some material object. The very word to “think,” implying the exercise of our mental faculties, is probably an offset from the substantive “thing.”