leonardo da vinci last supper painting

leonardo da vinci last supper painting a naiad's head, crowned with lotus-flowers, rising out of them; an elf
sitting in a hedge-sparrow's nest, under a wreath of hawthorn-bloom.
One morning I fell to sketching a face: what sort of a face it
was to be, I did not care or know. I took a soft black pencil, gave it
a broad point, and worked away. Soon I had traced on the paper a broad
and prominent forehead and a square lower outline of visage: that
contour gave me pleasure; my fingers proceeded actively to fill it
with features. Strongly-marked horizontal eyebrows must be traced
under that brow; then followed, naturally, a well-defined nose, with a
straight ridge and full nostrils; then a flexible-looking mouth, by no
leonardo da vinci last supper painting
means narrow; then a firm chin, with a decided cleft down the middle
of it: of course, some black whiskers were wanted, and some jetty
hair, tufted on the temples, and waved above the forehead. Now for the
eyes: I had left them to the last, because they required the most
careful working. I drew them large; I shaped them well: the
eyelashes I traced long and sombre; the irids lustrous and large.
'Good! but not quite the thing,' I thought, as I surveyed the
effect: 'they want more force and spirit'; and I wrought the shades
blacker, that the lights might flash more brilliantly- a happy touch
or two secured success. There, I had a friend's face under my gaze; leonardo da vinci last supper painting