remembered for their quaint or fantastic headgear: the so-called Beatrice d’Este with her gold-meshed hair-net; Beatrice Cenci, with her big turban; Holbein’s Jane Seymour, with her pointed cap; Botticelli’s Lucrezia Tornabuoni, with the pearl festoons and strange aigrette. Some of Reynolds’s child pictures are delightful subjects within reach of all. Penelope Boothby’s mob cap and lace mitts, Simplicity’s cap, and the Strawberry Girl’s turban are easily imitated. Of course, the kind of portrait painting which depends upon psychological interest is quite beyond the province of our simple game.
An elaborate landscape composition is also obviously impossible in house tableaux without painted scenery, and it is best not to be too ambitious in this direction, keeping to the simplest settings. An out-of-doors program may be arranged in the summer, making a unique entertainment. Then the Sower, and the Lark, Murillo’s Beggar Boys, and some of Reynolds’s portraits can be rendered with most satisfactory effect.
After a few experiments in picture-posing, children will enjoy selecting their own subjects, rummaging through illustrated books and magazines for their material. The following lists may be helpful as a beginning:—
Single Girl Figures—
- Titian’s Lavinia.
- Chase’s Alice.
- Reynolds’s Penelope Boothby, Age of Innocence, Miss Bowles, Strawberry Girl.
