“Your ale-berries, caudles and possets each one,
And sillabubs made at the milking pail,
Although they be many, beer comes not in any,
But all are composed with a pot of good ale.”
Syllabub glasses, as far as there were special glasses used, were of deep cup or tumbler shape, the brim flaring outward.
Cordial and Strong Waters Glasses.—The art of distillation came from Arabia, as the name alcohol (al Kohl) indicates. Northern peoples, however, for a long time preferred, to the distilled products, cordial waters made from honey, fruit syrups, spices, and various herbs. Each notable housewife had her own recipes for cordials, and many and quaint were the products that came from the family still-room. It was not, indeed, until comparatively recent times that the habit of spirit-drinking made any great headway in England. Whisky was made in Ireland in the fourteenth century, and must consequently have been known in England. Howell in his “Letters” refers to the usquebaugh of Ireland, but remarks that “whereas in England they drink it in aqua vitæ glasses, in Ireland they drink it in beer glasses.” The quotation proves that even at that early period special glasses for spirits were in use. Greene, some thirty years later, includes among the glasses he ordered from Venice small glasses marked for brandj.
The taste was probably intensified after the Revolution of 1688 brought numbers of Dutchmen into the country. The glasses employed were, generally speaking, miniature replicas of the wine glasses in vogue; others are short-stemmed, and as this did not lend itself to air-twisting, the baluster type was mostly affected, which in such small glasses gives a peculiarly massive appearance. Opaque-twisted stems are, however, more frequently met with, as are fluted ones. Sometimes the bowls are fluted or faceted. The dumpy, thick-stemmed, wide-bowled cordial glasses are often termed “Hogarth” glasses, they being the prevailing type in his pictures.
The modern equivalents are the “firing” glasses used at Masonic banquets, the members after each toast knocking the glasses in unison on the table—the sound produced being fancifully likened to the reports of guns. Figs. 1 and 2 (p. 160) are illustrations of firing glasses, the former being antique and the latter modern and strictly utilitarian.
Not all cordial and strong waters glasses belong to this type. Some of the most valuable have long stems, either plain or opaque-twisted. Many of the latter, however, came from the Netherlands and stand outside the category of English glasses.
The “thistle” glass has come to be the recognised Scottish liqueur glass. The form originated, it is believed, in Bohemia, but once it had made its way here, it was natural that the Scots should take for their national liquor the glass that bore the form of their national emblem. At any rate the beginning of the Scottish glass industry was marked by the production of a thistle glass, which was made at the factories in Edinburgh.
Tavern and Household Glasses.—It is customary to refer to tavern and household glass as belonging to a separate classification. There is really no justification for any such division; it is perfectly natural that utensils for common use should be stronger and clumsier editions of the better-class glasses. The very earliest were clumsy in the extreme as regards design, and rough in execution, but later specimens show greater elaboration and skill.
With the advent of the drawn glass, most tavern and household glasses took this form, and have retained it with little variation. Two kinds are noticeable—those with a “blow” inside the stem, and those without. In the drawn stems the blow shrank in dimensions, and became a tear, which, by the way, is almost invariably upside down, the broader end being uppermost. Half-way through the eighteenth century the tear vanished altogether, and the plain solid stem came into use. The common wine glasses were small editions of the larger glasses, and frequently bore rudely executed decorations of festoons, vine leaves, and flowers. The feet are flat, and may be either folded or unfolded, the former being of the earlier type. Specimens are fairly easily obtainable, the thickness of the metal and the stoutness of the design carrying them safely through the dangers to which they were specially liable. Apart from their age they have no special merit. The metal is as inferior as the form.
Tumblers were less frequently made in the eighteenth century than were wine glasses, and in the early part, at any rate, those that were met with were chiefly foreign importations. It is possible that the plain lines of the tumbler did not appeal to tastes accustomed to the graceful outlines of the wine glasses. The early ones are cylinder-shaped, and very large, while eighteenth-century tumblers taper somewhat toward the base. Both are very scarce. Now and again one meets the barrel shape. Foreign tumblers are often profusely decorated by engraving, colouring, and gilding—the quality of the decoration being distinctly inferior to its quantity.