Chats on Old Earthenware

VICAR & MOSES. Modelled by RALPH WOOD. About 1750. Marked R. WOOD, BURSLEM. At British Museum.
BY ARTHUR HAYDEN AUTHOR OF CHATS ON OLD CHINA, CHATS ON OLD PRINTS, ETC.
WITH A COLOURED FRONTISPIECE AND 150 ILLUSTRATIONS, AND TABLES OF OVER 200 ILLUSTRATED MARKS
NEW YORK FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY PUBLISHERS 1909
( All rights reserved. )
TO MY OLD FRIEND WALTER EASSIE WHOSE FINE ENTHUSIASM HAS BEEN A STIMULANT, AND WHOSE EVER-READY HELP HAS ADDED MANY ARTISTIC TOUCHES TO THIS VOLUME.

Five years have now elapsed since the publication of my volume, Chats on English China, and in the interval a great number of readers have written to me suggesting that I should write a companion volume dealing with old English earthenware. It is my hope that this complementary volume will prove of equal value to that large class of collectors who desire to know more about their hobby but are fearful to pursue the subject further without special guidance.
It is a matter for congratulation in these days, when so many books have only a short life for one season, to know that, owing to the enterprise of my publisher in making the Chats Series for collectors so widely known, the volume dealing with old English China still retains its vitality, and holds its place as a popular guide to collecting with profit.
As far as is possible in the limits of this volume, the subject of old English earthenware has been dealt with in order to show how peculiarly national the productions of the potter have been. The collection of old English earthenware, in the main, is still within the reach of those who have slender purses. English china during the last decade has reached prohibitive prices, and there is every likelihood that old English earthenware will in the near future become of unprecedented value.
I have carefully refrained from confining my treatment of the subject to rare museum examples which are unlikely to come under the hand of the average collector. It is necessary to have the ideal in view, but it must be borne in mind that such specimens must always be ideal to the larger number of collectors. I have, therefore, without belittling the old potters' art, given considerable attention to the golden mean in the realm of old earthenware to be collected.