with no more trouble than it takes to make the five-point.
Fold the paper as in Figs. 195, 196, and 197 (see Reticule). Fold the form (Fig. 197) fan-wise, at the dotted lines on Fig. 211, making the divisions equal (Fig. 212). Press the folds down until they are flat (Fig. 213), and make the cut at the place indicated by the dotted line. When the paper is unfolded you will have the six-pointed star, Fig. 214.
[Illustration: FIGS. 211-214.--A Six-pointed Star, with One Cut.]
This is the star of the East, which guided the wise men to the lowly manger--the Star of Bethlehem, a grander and better symbol than the irregular five-pointed star. The six-pointed star stands for Peace on Earth, Good Will to Men. The magicians of old called the six-pointed star the “pentacle” of Solomon.
One of the oldest and most venerated symbols is
and if you make one of the proportions of five squares, each of the three arms of equal size, and equal to the square space in the middle, you may, by
This will, at first glance, look like an impossibility, but if you find the middle of the top end of the cross (Fig. 215), and lay a straight-edge from the middle point E, touching the corner F, and rule the line E F G, then rule a line from H to F, and cut where the lines are ruled, you will have four irregular pieces, A, B, C, and D, which you may fit together in the form of a square (Fig. 216).
This is amusement enough for one rainy day, and for the next one you may try something more artistic, and consequently more difficult and interesting.
HOW TO PREPARE AND GIVE A BOYS’ CHALK-TALK.
A natural taste or talent for art is almost universal. If any of my readers doubt this statement let them supply all the youngsters in their neighborhood with colored chalks and note the result.
My word for it, there will not be a paving-flag, wall or fence in the ward, which offers an opportunity for a picture, which will not be profusely decorated with brilliantly colored, grotesque figures.
The truth is that the ability and desire to draw, come just as natural to a child as its ability and desire to talk.
[Illustration: FIGS. 217 and 218.--The Drawing-board.]
That almost all children learn to talk with more or less fluency, while few learn to draw with any approach to skill, is because talking is encouraged and systematically taught from earliest infancy, while drawing is discouraged, and has been ever since the days of old Sakya-Muni, 400 years before the Christian era. Sakya, the narrow-minded old heathen, thought it detrimental to progress in virtue to waste one’s time with pencil or brush. And to-day, in the gray light of the dawn of the twentieth century, boys are often forbidden to draw and few are encouraged in the practice, so that, in fear of punishment, the youngsters give vent to their artistic feelings by slyly decorating the flags, walls, and fences.