Page 166 - Chinese Art, Vol II By Stephen W. Bushell

36 CHINESE ART.

by a background of briDiant blue. Fig. 28 is a tall ovoid jar with a
cover, one of a pair, painted in compartments with female figures,
or Lange lysen, alternating with vases and sprays of flowers. Fig.
29, a vase, one of a set of three, painted with a floral ground of
conventional chrysanthemum design, interrupted by panels of
diverse shape containing pictures of landscapes, baskets of flowers,
sea-horses and deer, together with diverse bands of fret and diaper.
Fig. 30, one of a pair of vases luxuriantly decorated with conven-
tional flowers and foliage defined by foliated borders. Another vase,
with flaring mouth and lightly spreading foot, painted in blue with
four-clawed dragons rising from waves into the clouds outlined
with bands of fret, and which is marked underneath with a leaf and
fillet, is illustrated in Fig. 31 ; and in Fig. 32 a bottle, with a pair
of lions sporting with brocaded balls, on the body, an archaic dragon
pursuing a pearl, on the neck. A fine bowl is presented in Fig. 33,
with waved edge and a band of embossed leaves round the bottom,
painted in brilliant blue with literary ladies of gracious mien and
groups of boys playing games.
Another artistic phase of cobalt decoration is exhibited in the
next two pictures, in which the finely pounded pigment is blown
upon the raw body to produce, when glazed, a " powder blue,"
or bleti fotiette ground, which is interrupted by shaped panels re-
served in white. The panel pictures are painted, in Fig. 34, with
underglaze cobalt blue of the same tone as the ground
; in Fig. 35,
with bright overglaze enamel colours of the famille vcrte style. In
other examples of the class, which we have no space to present
here, the powder blue ground is pencilled over with gold ; or again,
has reserves of fishes and other designs filled in with vermilion
and gold. But the bleu foiietU is at its very best as a monochrome,
unadorned, thickly strewn with tiny specks of intense blue shading
down as they mix and melt into the pellucid glaze.
The vase in Fig. 36 is decorated with archaic dragons and cloud-
scrolls mingled with symbols of longevity and happiness, all