Color  Terms.                             15

lustreless, appearing on a dull, sometimes velvety sur¬
face, while again it may be more or less glossy, even to
the degree of appearing as if varnished. To deal with
these variations, however, requires simply the use of
suitable adjectives. For example: To indicate a color
which has no lustre or brightness, the adjective matt
(or mat) may be used, in preference to dull, which im¬
plies reduction in purity or chroma; other adjectives,
appropriate in special cases, being velvety, glossy, bur¬
nished metallic, matt-metallic, etc.

Color Terms.—No other person has presented so
forcibly the urgent need for reform in popular nomen¬
clature nor stated so clearly and concisely its short¬
comings and the simple remedy, as Mr. Milton Bradle5^
from one of whose educational pamphlets on the subject*
the following is quoted : "The list of words now em¬
ployed to express qualities or degrees of color is very
small, in fact a half dozen comprise the more common
terms, and these are pressed into service on all occasions,
and in such varied relations that they not only fail to
express anything definite but constantly contradict
themselves . . . Tint, Hue and Shade are employed
so loosely by the public generally, even by those people
who claim to use English correctly, that neither word
has a very definite meaning, although each is capable of
being as accurately used as any other word in our every
day vocabulary"

Certainly one would expect that men of learning, at
least, would employ the broader color terms correctly;
but some of the highest autorities on color-physics habit¬
ually use them interchangeably, as if they were quite
synonymous; and even the dictionaries, with few ex¬
ceptions, give incorrect or "hazy" definitions of these
 

*.Some rriticisms of Popular Color Definitions and Suggestions for a better
Color Nomenclatuie. Milton Bradley Co., Springfield, Mass. (Small pamphlet oi
l.") Images).