No glass which is to contain a liquid of pleasant colour should be so strong in tint as to mar the beauty of the contained fluid, and especially is this true when the colour of the glass is of an opposite character to that of the liquid: thus a red liquid placed in a strongly-coloured green glass becomes highly offensive in appearance, and yet we often see claret served in green hock-glasses. A dinner-table requires colour. Let the cloth be pale buff, or cream-colour, instead of white; and the glass water-vessels of very pale, but refined and various, tints; and the salt-cellars, if of glass, also coloured, in a tender and befitting manner, and a most harmonious effect will be produced. The flowers with which the table is adorned would then harmonise with the other things, and much beauty might be produced.
Respecting the ornamentation of glass, two methods of treatment are resorted to, which are "cutting" and "engraving." Both modes deal with glass as a hard, crystal-like substance; and consist in grinding the surface, and either leaving it "dead" or repolishing it. In the case of "cutting" a considerable portion of the substance of the glass is generally removed, and the surface is repolished; but in the case of "engraving" little more than the surface is generally acted upon, and the engraved portion remains dead.
Cutting may be employed in bringing about ornamental effects in glass, but it is rarely to be commended when so lavishly used as to be the chief means of giving form to the vessel; indeed, cutting should be sparingly and judiciously used. A vessel formed of glass should never be wholly shaped by cutting, as though it were a work of stone. If the neck of a decanter can be made more convenient by being slightly cut—if it can be so treated that it can be held more securely—then let it be cut; but in all cases avoid falling into the error of too much cutting which causes the work to appear laboured, for any work which presents the appearance of having been the result of much labour is as unpleasant to look upon as that work is pleasing which results from the exercise of momentary skill. There is a great art-principle manifested in the expression "Let there be light, and there was light."
Engraving is also laborious, and while it is capable of yielding most delicate and beautiful effects, it should yet be somewhat sparingly used, for extravagance in labour is never desirable, and there is such a thing as extravagance of beauty.
However delicate ornament may be, and however well composed, yet if it covers the whole of the walls of an apartment and of the objects which it contains, it fails to please. There must be the contrast of plain surfaces with ornamented—plain for the eye to rest upon, ornament for the mind to enjoy. In the enrichment of glass these remarks fully apply. Let there be plain surfaces as well as ornamented parts, and the effect will be more satisfying than if all be covered with ornament.
All that I said respecting the decoration of damask table-linen will apply equally to glass, considering only the different way in which the effect is produced (see Chap. VI., [page 108]). Thus we have ornament produced only by a variation of surface. Such simple means of producing an art-effect are capable of rendering in a satisfactory manner simple treatments only, but simple patterns are capable of yielding the highest pleasure, and such patterns can be almost perfectly rendered by engraving, as shown in Figs. 141, 142, 143.[28]
Somewhat elaborate effects can be rendered in glass by very laborious engraving, whereby different depths of cutting are attained; but such work is the result of great labour, and rarely produces an effect proportionate to the toil expended upon it; and if a bottle so engraved is filled with a coloured wine, the entire beauty of its engraving is destroyed. Fig. 144 is a drawing of a most elaborately engraved bottle, which was shown in the Exhibition of 1862. It represents, to a great extent, wasted labour.