The bat is a symbol of happiness from its name fu having the same sound as fu (happiness). Among insects, the cicada (at one time regarded as a symbol of life renewed after death) is a very ancient motive; and the praying mantis who catches the cicada is an emblem of courage and perseverance.[511] Fighting crickets are the fighting cocks of China, and supply a sporting motive for the decorator; and butterflies frequently occur with floral designs or in the decoration known as the Hundred Butterflies, which covers the entire surface of the vessel with butterflies and insects.
Flower painting is another forte of the Chinese decorator, and some of the most beautiful porcelain designs are floral. Conventional flowers appear in scrolls, and running designs, especially the lotus and peony scrolls and the scrolls of “fairy flowers,” the pao hsiang hua of the Ming blue and white. But the most attractive designs are the more naturalistic pictures of flowering plants and shrubs, or of floral bouquets in baskets or vases. The flowers on Chinese porcelain are supple, free, and graceful; and, though true enough to nature to be easily identified, are never of the stiff copy-book order which the European porcelain painter affected at one unhappy period. A long list of the Chinese porcelain flowers given by Bushell includes the orchid (lan), rose, jasmine, olea fragrans, pyrus japonica, gardenia, syringa, several kinds of peony, magnolia (yü lan), iris, hydrangea, hibiscus, begonia, pink and water fairy flower (narcissus tazetta). Many more no doubt can be identified, for the Chinese are great cultivators as they are great lovers of flowers. In fact, the word hua
flowery is synonymous with Chinese, and chung hua
is China. Plate [126] is an example of the Hundred Flower design, known by the French name mille fleurs, in which the ground of the vase is a mass of naturalistic flowers so that the porcelain looks like a bouquet.
There are special flowers for the months[512]:—(1) Peach (t’ao) for February, (2) Tree Peony (mu tan) for March, (3) Double Cherry (ying t’ao) for April, (4) Magnolia (yü lan) for May, (5) Pomegranate (shih liu) for June, (6) Lotus (lien hua) for July, (7) Pear (hai t’ang) for August, (8) Mallow (ch’iu k’uei) for September, (9) Chrysanthemum (chü) for October, (10) Gardenia (chih hua) for November, (11) Poppy (ying su) for December, (12) Prunus (mei hua) for January. From these are selected four to represent the seasons—mu-tan peony for spring, lotus for summer, chrysanthemum for autumn, and prunus for winter—which supply charming motives for panel decoration or for the sides of quadrangular vases.
The chrysanthemum besides is associated with its admirer T’ao Yüan-ming, and the lotus with Chou Mao-shu and the poet Li T’ai-po. But as a rule the floral designs carry some hidden meaning, the flowers being grouped so as to suggest some felicitous phrase by a play on their names.[513] The peony we have seen to be the fu kuei (riches and honours) flower; the chrysanthemum, as Dr. Laufer has suggested, being the flower of the ninth (chiu) month, may connote longevity through the word chiu (long-enduring); the prunus (mei hua) carries the obvious suggestion of mei (beautiful), and instances might easily be multiplied.
Among the trees, the cassia suggests literary honours, the willow longevity, as also the pine, bamboo and plum, who are called the “three friends,”[514] faithful even in the “winter of our discontent.” Among the fruits the gourd is an emblem both of long life and of fertility, and the three fruits (san kuo)—peach, pomegranate and finger citron—symbolise the Three Abundances of Years, Sons and Happiness. The orange is a symbol of good luck, and no doubt the others which occur less frequently contain similar suggestions.
Landscape (shan shui) is one of the four main divisions of Chinese pictorial art, and it is well represented in porcelain decoration. The Sung and Ming masters provided designs which were freely copied, and views of the beauty spots of China and of the celebrated parks and pleasure grounds were frequently used. It is one of these landscapes which the English potters borrowed for the familiar “willow pattern” design, and the sentimental tale which some fanciful writer has attached to the pattern is a mere afterthought. Figure subjects and landscapes are combined in many designs, such as the meeting of sages, romantic incidents, besides the more homely motives of field work, fishing, rustics returning from the plough mounted on their oxen, and the like. The four seasons, too, are represented in landscape with appropriate accessories, such as blossoming peach trees in a mountain scene for spring, a lake scene with lotus gatherers for summer, a swollen river and autumn tints for autumn, and a snowstorm for winter.