And so no dark trial, no grievous judgment, can cross our sky without revealing some spot of heavenly blue in the midst of it, or if concealed for a moment, breaking forth again with greater brightness and beauty.
Rev. Dr. Hugh Macmillan.
[CHINA MARKS.]
ENGLISH PORCELAIN.
PART I.
The name porcelain is derived from the Italian porcellana, signifying a cowrie shell, on account of the delicate translucent glaze on its surface. At how early a date the manufacture of pottery began in this country, before the Roman invasion, is not absolutely known. In the Anglo-Saxon times the pottery of the Celtic tribes was confined to the manufacture of cinerary urns and very common utensils of household use; as they preferred the employment of glass and horn for drinking purposes, and metal or wood for solid food. In the thirteenth century pottery was reinstated in public favour; and a great advance was made in the art, a glaze being employed from the fourteenth to the beginning of the sixteenth century, when a new description of pottery was invented, a salt-glazed stoneware, which came into the market with importations of Italian fayence and oriental porcelain.
It was not until the good Père d'Entrecolles introduced into this country the learning of that ancient Empire of China, in the mysteries of the ceramic art, that our own ideas became enlarged and elevated above the improvements made in our potteries. The Père, being a resident in a district distinguished for its porcelain manufactories, sent samples to his own country (A.D. 1727, 1729,) with information as to the substances employed at King-te-Chin, for which kilns affording greater heat and suitable for firing the differently-coloured enamels were employed.
Hard paste was made at Plymouth, Bristol and Lowestoft, and the soft paste at Chelsea, Bow, Derby, Nantgarw, Liverpool, Pinxton, Swansea, Rockingham, Worcester, Shropshire and Staffordshire; felspar being superadded in the latter two manufactories. The soft paste is produced from an alkaline flux, combining chalk, bone-ash, sand or gypsum.