Page 11 - Chinese Porcelain Vol I, Galland

PREFACE.

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The aim of this little work is simply to try and place at the
service of amateurs a handbook such as the writer felt the
want of when first interested in Chinese
porcelain, explaining
the technical terms, and giving other information likely to be
useful or in connection with the in as
interesting subject,
simple a way as possible.
We are much in the dark as on and
very yet many points,
cannot determine with certainty the age of much of the china
we possess. However, we will find less difficulty, and perhaps
more amusement, in the motives we see thereon, as
studying
also in discovering the purposes for which the various shapes
were
originally designed. The more we understand our china,
the better we shall like it and value it ; while, talking of age,
in a short time now another will have com-
very century
menced, when it will seem all at once to be a hundred years
older, which cannot but increase its value in the eyes of the
world at laro-e.
The writer to return his best thanks to the authorities
begs
of the South Kensington Museum and Mr. A. B. Skinner, Mr.
Messrs. Duveen Bros., Mr. T. J. Larkin, and
George Salting,
all his friends, who have so allowed their stores to be
kindly
drawn upon to furnish the illustrations for this little book.
These examples for the most part have been taken from the
ordinary run of china generally to be met with in private
families, and so long as a piece illustrated a particular class,