Page 198 - Chinese Art, Vol II By Stephen W. Bushell

CHINESE ART.
42
the star-god of literature, wielding a brush, and the successful
scholar holding up a twig plucked from the sacred Olea fragrans tree,
all pencilled in blue, relieved by a mottled " peach-bloom " ground
of copper red.
A small egg-shell saucer-dish, one of a pair, Fig. 60, painted with
a dragon-fly and sprays of peonies passing over the rim, and pen-
cilled underneath with the seal of Ch'ien Lung, is selected as an
excellent example of the kuan yao, cr " imperial porcelain " of the
time, distinguished for its artistic designs and finished execution.
The cup and saucer from the Cope Collection recently bequeathed
to the museum, Fig. 61, is interesting because the artist has attached
his seals to his work with the inscriptions Pai Shih Shan Jen, i.e.,
" The egg-shell dish,
The Hermit of the White Stone (grotto)."*
Fig. 62, with rose-coloured border underneath, is decorated inside
with a pair of mandarin ducks, flowers, and brocaded bands of
diaper. The plate. Fig. 63, painted in over-glaze blue with touches
of buff, reveals a pair of lovers discoursing music, with the usual
cultured surroundings of a Chinese interior.
Fig. 64 is an egg-shell dish of the class decorated for Europe,
which is painted with a Chinese copy of a European engraving
"
of the Discovery of Moses by Pharaoh's Daughter," in the usual
Chinese environment. Fig. 65 illustrates part of an " armorial
China" dinner service, of late Ch'ien Lung date, brought from
Fort St. George, Madras, with pierced openwork borders, painted
in colours with gilding, displaying the arms of the Honourable East
India Company, and its motto on a scroll —^.xuspicio. regis, et.
:
SENATUS. ANGLI.E.
* A similar saucer with the same decoration etched in Jacquemart's
Histoire de la Porcelaine (Plate viii., Fig. 3) has the seal Pai Skill attached to
an inscription dated tlie cyclical year chia-ch'hi (a.d. 1724). A beautiful
rose-backed egg-shell dish painted with quails, presented to the British Museum
by theHon. Sir R. H. Meade, with the same nom de plume of Pai Shih, is addition-
ally inscribed LjMg wan /j«a c/i<', i.e., "Painted at Canton," indicating that our
artist's ateher was in that city, and that the porcelain was bi ought there
overland " in the white " for liini to decorate in the style so liiglily ap-
preciated in Europe.