In making _Built-up_ letters--which have both outer and inner strokes--the inner strokes should generally be made first (see p. 121).
_Plain and Ornamental Forms._--Not only for the sake of readableness, but to promote a beautiful and dignified effect, the forms of letters are kept simple when the text is long. And, generally, the less frequent the type, the more ornamental may be its form (see pp. 126, 210, 298, 330).
BEAUTY OF UNIFORMITY (_As the assimilation of the corresponding parts--"bodies," "limbs," "heads"--and as the "family likeness," of the different letters, so that they go well together_)
Right uniformity makes for readableness and beauty, and is the result of good craftsmanship.
_Readableness._--Where the text letters are uniform, the reader is free to give his attention to the sense of the words, whereas the variations in an irregular or changing text are distracting.[56]
_Beauty._--The abstract beauty-of-uniformity may be said to lie in this, that the different letters, or individual elements, "_go well together_." The beautiful effect of uniform lettering is thus caused by the united forces, as it were, of all the letters.
_Good Craftsmanship._--A pen, or other letter-making tool, being handled freely and regularly, the uniform movements of the tool in similar cases will produce uniform strokes, &c. (On the other hand, the interruption and loss of freedom to the [p255] writer who is irregular, or who forces an unnatural variety,[57] results in inferior work.)
RIGHT ARRANGEMENT _BEAUTY OF ARRANGEMENT_ (_As having a general fitness in the placing, connecting, and spacing of letters, words, and lines, in the disposal of the lettering in the given space, and in the proportioning of every part of the lettering and its margins_)
The particular fitness of a given inscription depends upon considerations of its particular _office_, _position_, _material_, &c. (see pp. 100, 351). For general use, however, the craftsman has certain regular modes of disposing and spacing the lettering, and proportioning the whole. And, as in constructing individual letters, so in treating lettering as a whole, he endeavours to give his work the qualities that make for readableness: viz. _simplicity_, _distinctiveness_, _and proportion_.