Porcelain

174

Generally known as the Duc de Bourbon (1710-40). He was an enthusiast for the art of the Far East. An important work on Chinese art was published under his auspices in 1735. He imitated the painted hangings of the East, and even attempted to make Japanese lacquer. After his death, the two brothers Dubois, épiciers à Chantilly, migrated to Vincennes, and the Chantilly works were for a time neglected. See Gustave Macon, Les arts dans la Maison de Condé, 1903.

175

Of the many European imitations of the ‘Kakiyemon’ style the Chantilly is most successful, while the ‘Old Japan’ was best copied at Chelsea. No European imitation in porcelain of the Chinese blue and white approaches in brilliancy that made in Delft ware in the seventeenth century.

176

The porcelain of Saint-Cloud and Chantilly is well represented in the Fitzhenry collection.

177

Some twenty miles south of Paris, not far from Corbeil.

178

The name is written ‘Sèves’ in English catalogues of the eighteenth century, and the same form is found sometimes in contemporary French writings. We may compare the favourite signature ‘Fédéric’ of the Prussian king.

179

Mémoire Historique pour la Manufacture, rédigé en 1781 par Bachelier, re-edited, with preface and notes, by G. Gouellain, Paris, 1878.

180

See the note on p. 286. It would seem that the first successes at Vincennes were, in a measure, dependent upon the temporary breaking up of the factory at Chantilly on the death of the Duc de Bourbon in 1740.

181

At a later time this man had a contract for the delivery of the paste, the secret of which he preserved, at a fixed rate per pound. In one year he is said to have received for this 800,000 livres!

182

Such is my general impression, but M. Garnier, I see, speaks highly of his artistic capabilities. Bachelier founded in 1763 a free school of design, one of the few institutions of the old régime that have survived the many changes of government. It still exists as the École Nationale des Beaux-Arts.

183

By this we get a hint as to the kind of ware made at Vincennes at the commencement, when under the influence of Chantilly.

184

The account-books of these sales are still preserved. M. Davillier, in his little book on Les porcelaines de Sèvres et Madame du Barry, quotes the record of purchases made (at a later date, for the most part) by the royal family, by Madame du Deffand, and by M. de Voltaire. The latter bought, for 120 livres, ‘Deux bustes de mondit Sieur, en biscuit.’ Besides this, large sales were made yearly to the trade.

185

The above description is that given by the Prince de Ligne in his memoirs. In the Johanneum at Dresden there is now to be seen a ‘bouquet’ which in every way corresponds to the prince’s account. The Meissen works for long had the credit of this trophy, but it is now acknowledged that it is identical with the present sent by the dauphine, in 1748, to her father, the Elector of Saxony. M. Davillier quotes a curious account from a contemporary memoir describing the difficulties and expenses incurred in transporting this ‘bouquet’ from Paris to Dresden. Are we, then, to regard it as the actual present given by M. de Fulvi to the queen, or as a duplicate?

186

See for this and other references to porcelain in the chronique scandaleuse of the day, the little book of M. Davillier quoted above.

187

Some attention was paid to the housing and comfort of the workmen at the new establishment, but Bachelier makes no mention of ‘the gardens, cascades, fruit-trees, groves, woods, and a small chase for the artists, who enjoyed to hunt the stag and the wild boar none the less for their sedentary lives in the art palace’ (Marryat, p. 414). On the contrary, we are told that in a few years the houses and workshops were already threatening to fall down on the workmen’s heads.

188

M. Bertin was himself a great collector of Chinese porcelain. In the avertissement of the catalogue of his collection which was sold in Paris in 1815, we are told that through the medium of the Père Amiot he obtained many choice specimens, some of them direct presents from the Chinese emperor. We have already alluded to Kien-lung’s interest in exotic wares, and to the influence of these upon the native decoration.

189

In the fond lapis caillouté the deep blue ground is painted with fine veins of gold, to imitate the pyrites which generally accompanies the native stone (lapis lazuli). It was used as early as 1758 (see Wallace collection, Gallery xviii., Case c.).

190

As many as one hundred and sixty pieces, it is said, were carried off during a fire at Tsarskoe Selo. Some of these were afterwards repurchased by the Tsar Nicholas.

191

Marryat quotes a passage to the following effect from a little work published at Venice soon after the death of the favourite. Praising the good taste of the ‘Madame Marchesa,’ the writer states that this was, above all, manifested in the adornment of her table. All the porcelain was expressly manufactured for her at Sèvres, and was of a rose colour mixed with gold. The value amounted to 257,000 livres, and no sovereign possessed a service of equal beauty.

192

It is found as a ground on pieces bearing the earliest letter-marks, so that it is difficult to accept the statement that it was first made by Xhrouet, a painter of landscapes, in 1757.

193

Much of it found its way to England, and was there decorated in the old Sèvres style, both in London and in the West.

194

For a detailed description of these deposits and their geological relations, see Brongniart’s great work.

195

Napoleon at one time sent Daru to Sèvres to convey to Brongniart, in the most lively terms, his dissatisfaction with what he called the simplicity and tameness of the designs in use at Sèvres. Every piece should, he protests, ‘dire quelque chose.’ Every plate should record glorious deeds, the capture of the enemy’s towns, or the triumphant return of the victors.

196

We must, however, place some of these discoveries to the credit of the staff of the Viennese factory, and Dihl again, the chemist of the porcelain works in the Rue de Bondy, has a claim to others.

197

The death of M. Garnier occurred since the above was written.

198

The use of a bone-paste ware of the ‘Spode’ type is, however, now prevalent not only in many parts of the continent, but porcelain of this kind is now largely made in the United States.

199

Unless it be in the catalogue drawn up by Sir A. W. Franks for his collection of continental china. The ceramic collection in the Hamburg Museum has also been very thoroughly catalogued by Dr. Brinckmann.

200

It is curious to find Venice at this time exporting porcelain to the East, for at an earlier period it was through this town that so much Oriental porcelain and fayence reached Europe.

201

This Venetian china, either of hard paste or of the hybrid class, must not be confused with the opaque glass, the lattimo, or, more properly, Latisuol, ware, made about 1730 in imitation of porcelain both at Murano, and also near Bassano.

202

Compare with this the use of steatite, a magnesian rock, from the Lizard, at Worcester, and at other West of England factories. The Chinese have also at times made use of a steatitic rock.

203

Marryat (p. 451) gives an interesting account of this enterprising man. He was occupied also in the draining of marshes, the improvement of agriculture, and the promotion of commerce.

204

With this appointment we may perhaps connect the elaborate trophy of white porcelain at South Kensington. The figures of slaves on which this is supported are modelled after those of Tacca on the celebrated monument at Leghorn. This piece is attributed, however, to the Capo di Monte factory.

205

The word ‘china’ is sometimes used in Spain in the same vague sense as in England, but the name seems only to have come in with the Staffordshire ware so largely imported in the last century. Note, however, that the factory at Buen Retiro was known as La China.

206

I quote this remarkable passage from Sir A. W. Franks’s paper on the origin of the Chelsea porcelain works (Archæol. Journal, 1862). Marryat misquotes and misinterprets the passage.

207

One possible exception to this very general statement may be found in a pamphlet quoted by Mr. Solon, Instructions how to make as good china as was ever sold by the East India Company by A. Hill, London, 1716. According to this writer, fragments of Oriental china were to be finely ground and mixed with fluxing and plastic materials to form a paste. Now there is evidence that at a much later date ‘potsherds’ were imported from China, and ground up to form an ingredient of the porcelain, both at Bow and at Worcester.

208

The memorandum-book of Duesbury, the future porcelain king, begins in 1742. He was then working, on weekly wages, as an ‘enameller’ of china figures. But was the ware that he was decorating at this time a true porcelain?

209

Mr. Burton says that at the present day the Staffordshire porcelain is composed of bone-ash 6 parts, china-stone 4 parts, and kaolin 3½ parts.

210

Mr. Willett, of Brighton, has a pair of ‘goat and bee’ jugs in silver, with the hall-mark of 1739.

211

There is an interesting series of these very early pieces in the British Museum. A white ware salt-cellar, with crayfish in relief, has the triangle mark. A jug, in the form of a grotesque Chinaman, is a good specimen of the early paste. We notice the same waxy look in the paste that we find in the Saint-Cloud ware. The surface, however, is generally grayer.

212

In 1758 we find an advertisement of a house to let in ‘China Walk,’ Chelsea.

213

Both Gouyn and his successor, Sprimont, were very likely Walloons from the neighbourhood of Liége. In a contemporary work, however, the latter is spoken of as ‘a French artist of great abilities.’ Rouguet’s Present State of the Arts, 1755.

214

Note the term ‘earthenware.’ As in a much earlier proclamation of the time of Charles ii. (forbidding the importation of painted earthenware, except ‘those of China, and stone bottles and jugs’), the word is used officially to include porcelain.

215

Such a regulation would seem to show that in England the enamel-painters were in the field earlier than the manufacturers of porcelain.

216

The later date is supported by the statement of Sprimont in his ‘Case,’ that ‘the ground flat of the manufacturer has gone on still increasing,’ for we know that the works were enlarged in 1757. The expression ‘crowned head’ applies better to the King of Prussia than to the Elector of Saxony. In 1760, as we have seen, Count Schimmelmann was at Hamburg selling, on behalf of Frederick, part of the vast stocks accumulated at Meissen.

217

In a London paper of December 4, 1763, appeared the following statement—I quote from Mr. Nightingale’s book,—‘A few days since, his R. Highness the Duke of Cumberland was at Mr. Sprimont’s manufactory at Chelsea, and we are informed that his Highness will shortly purchase the same, that so matchless an art should not be lost.’ A week later, however, a formal contradiction of this report appeared in another paper, in the form of a note at the end of an advertisement of the sale of the contents of Sprimont’s factory. All this has a very modern air. We have a skilful combination of the ballon d’essai and the puff preliminary.

218

This collection has lately disappeared from its old home in the Geological Museum, where it had been the delight of two generations of collectors. Most of the specimens have, however, quite recently been discovered at South Kensington.

219

Much of the white ware at this time was decorated outside by ‘chamberers.’ Compare the memorandum-book of Duesbury quoted below.

220

The advertisement of these sales in contemporary newspapers, and many of the catalogues, have been collected together and reprinted by the late Mr. J. E. Nightingale.

221

Before this time the gold had been simply laid on with japanner’s size and only gently heated. See Burton’s English Porcelain, p. 46.

222

There was a revival of the practice of mounting, or, to use the old term, ‘garnishing’ porcelain in ormolu about this time. At Boulton’s works at Soho, near Birmingham, famous, a little later, in the history of the steam-engine, these metal mountings were largely made, and Wedgwood began to apply them to some of his wares (see Nightingale, p. xxxiv.).

223

I can find no confirmation of the statement that Roubiliac modelled figures for Sprimont. Certain statuettes bearing an R. impressed on the paste have been attributed to him. There is no reference to any such work in the life of the artist by M. Le Roy de St. Croix (Lyons, 1886). Roubiliac, who died in 1762, was already in 1750 at the height of his reputation, and fully employed in more important work.

224

Mr. Burton points out that it would be quite impossible to make a translucent ware with the materials of the first patent. He doubts also the use of bone-ash in the earlier porcelain of Bow, the paste of which is distinctly of the Saint-Cloud type. I think, however, that there can be little doubt but that the ‘virgin earth’ refers to bone-ash, and the fragments from Bow in which this substance has been found seem to be derived from an early ware.

225

Specimens from this find may be seen at the British Museum, at South Kensington, and in the late Jermyn Street collection. An interesting and detailed account of the fragments, which were excavated and arranged by Mr. Higgins of the adjacent match-works, will be found in Chaffers’s Marks, pp. 908 seq.

226

This difficulty of making the decoration keep pace with the outturn of the kilns was felt at this time at other kilns—from King-te-chen to Sèvres and Worcester. Recourse was more and more had to the outside enameller—the ‘chamberer’—on the one hand, and to transfer-printing on the other.

227

This document is exhibited at the British Museum by the side of the punch-bowl.

228

These figures are probably exaggerated. Sprimont, a little earlier, says that he was employing at Chelsea ‘at least one hundred hands.’

229

‘Printed teas and mugs’ are mentioned in Bowcocke’s memorandum-book in 1756.

230

See Nightingale’s English Porcelain, pp. li. seq., and Bemrose’s Bow, Chelsea, and Derby Porcelain, pp. 153 seq.

231

The rococo vases, however, of this ware in the British Museum seem to be of a somewhat later date, if we take Sprimont’s work at Chelsea as a criterion.

232

These ‘Darby figars’ may possibly have been of earthenware. There are some richly painted statuettes of this material at South Kensington, though these indeed seem to be of a somewhat later date.

233

Mr. Bemrose, in his work on Bow, Chelsea, and Derby Porcelain, gives photographic reproductions of several pages from Duesbury’s work-book.

234

These details I take from the notes of a man who had formerly practical experience of such work—Mr. Haslem, in his Old Derby China Factory.

235

And yet the colours are sometimes brilliant and effective—for example, on a large dish or tray of Spode ware at South Kensington (see below, p. 373). This strange ‘breaking-down’ of the old Japanese patterns may be compared to the scattered fragments of the original Greek design that we see on the pre-Roman coins of Gaul and Britain.

236

It appears from a correspondence that has been preserved that in 1791 the second Duesbury was looking out for royal support. ‘A gentleman about the court’ whom he consulted recommended him to seek the patronage of the Duke of Clarence, for, said he, ‘the duke is the only prince that pays the tradespeople.’ At that time there was great jealousy of the Worcester works, where the king had lately made large purchases.

237

Why Tonquin, of all places? We should rather have expected to find Nankin or Canton, as at Bow.

238

See the engraving in the Gentleman’s Magazine for August 1752. This was in the nature of a puff. In the corner we read ‘A sale of the Manufacture will begin at the Worcester Music Meeting on September 20th, with great variety of ware and, ’tis said, at a moderate price.’ Edward Cave, the originator of the Gentleman’s Magazine, and ‘the father of parliamentary reporting,’ was an important shareholder of the Worcester works.

239

Steatite is essentially a silicate of magnesia. We have seen that a soapy rock, probably of this nature, entered at times into the composition of the porcelain made at King-te-chen. At a later time silicate of magnesia, in various forms, has found its way into the hybrid pastes of Italy and Spain.

240

These two buildings may be probably traced back to the Temple of Vespasian, in the Forum, and to the Pyramid of Cestius respectively. Hancock must have got his materials from French and Italian engravings after Claude and Pannini.

241

Dr. Johnson was for a long time a close neighbour—his well-known interest in the manufacture of porcelain must have brought him into contact with the Baxter family. We find a Baxter mentioned in Bowcocke’s notes as early as 1751. See Chaffers, p. 896.

242

The teapot in the Schreiber collection with the mark ‘Allen, Lowestoft,’ must be regarded as a supercherie. The painting on it of a crucifixion is evidently by a Chinese hand. This teapot has, however, been connected with an Allen of Lowestoft, a porcelain enameller and amateur glass-stainer.

243

Some recent discoveries of moulds make it, however, probable that the early wares of Worcester and Bow were imitated at Lowestoft.

244

We are told that the first three of these substances are to be fritted together, but this would be manifestly impossible. The recipe is curious as being an anticipation of the materials used by Spode thirty years later. But we must receive most of these recipes that have thus come down to us cum grano.

245

This ‘soapy rock’ was at once identified with the steatite of the Lizard. The other porcelain experts, from Worcester and from Liverpool, who visited Cornwall about this time, seem to have devoted their attention more especially to this substance. They were thus, to some extent, on a false scent, for the Père D’Entrecolles probably somewhat exaggerated the importance of this Wha-she, and, moreover, as has been shown by later French investigation, most of the material of soapy consistency employed at King-te-chen is no true steatite or magnesian silicate, but rather a more fusible variety of the petuntse, containing much mica.

246

Was Frye, the painter of Bow, who first made use of the American earth, also a quaker? Cookworthy and Champion, it appears, first became acquainted with one another through the medium of one of the Bristol Frys, and it is known that moulds and patterns from Bow were used at Plymouth. It is at least remarkable that we should be indebted for our knowledge of the constitution of Chinese porcelain, in the first place, to a Jesuit father, and then to a member of the Society of Friends; while, on the other hand, Böttger—like Cookworthy, a druggist—was an adept in the dark arts.

247

Besides the factory mentioned in this letter, we hear from the diary of Dr. Pococke that as early as 1750 a white ware with reliefs was made at the ‘Lowris China house’ with ‘soapy-rock from Lizard Point.’ A sauce-boat marked ‘Bristoll’ is referred to these works in the Guide to English Pottery in the British Museum, p. 109.

248

Lauraguais (Comte de), Duc de Brancas, born 1733; died 1824.

249

See p. 306. At Strawberry Hill was ‘Michael Angelo’s Bacchus, made in the china of the Comte de Lauraguais, from the collection of the Comte de Caylus’ (Walpole’s Works, ii. 405 seq.).

250

By Champion, at least, at a later time. The cross swords have in some cases been subsequently obliterated (Pl. e. 84). Mr. Owen thinks that this was in consequence of a quarrel with the custom-house authorities in 1775.

251

And for tin also. The mark was adopted, no doubt, in honour of the ‘premier’ product of Cornwall. It would, however, be more in place on a ware with an opaque tin glaze, such as the soft paste of Chantilly.

252

So at Sèvres during the greater part of the last century the glaze has consisted of pegmatite, a very similar material to the Cornish growan-stone. The inconveniences of such a glaze have been pointed out by Vogt and others.

253

Of another workman employed by Champion, one Anthony Amatt, Mr. Hugh Owen gives some particulars. At one time, attempting to cross the Channel and find employment in France, he was arrested—at the instigation, it is said, of Wedgwood—and confined for some time as a State prisoner. Amatt died in 1851 at the age of ninety-two. Wedgwood was very active in preventing the emigration of English potters, who, he declared, were lured from their country by French and German agents (Meteyard’s Wedgwood, ii. p. 475).

254

There are also in existence some examples of undoubted Bristol hard-paste porcelain, covered with a soft lead glaze.

255

The porcelain made by Count Lauraguais, to judge by the analysis given above, must have contained even more kaolin than the Bristol ware.