Page 122 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

50 Chinese Pottery and Porcelain

of copper or iron oxide in an appreciable quantity. No doubt these

effects were at first accidental, but it is certain that observation

and experiment eventuallj^ taught the potters to produce them
systematically. Otherwise, how explain the appearance of these
colours in symmetrical splashes ? The flambe glazes of the eighteenth
century are kno^vn to have been produced by means of copper
oxide, and it is not unreasonable to infer its presence in similar

effects at an early date. But it is equally certain that many of

the changing tints in the thick, unev^en, bubbly glazes of the Sung
and Yiian wares are due to opalescence alone. This has been proved
to demonstration by Mr. Burton, who has produced from his kilns
a porcelain glaze with passages of pale lavender, and even flushes

of warm red, by using nothing but a thick, opalescent glaze entirely

innocent of any colouring oxide.
Finally, a word of explanation is needed with regard to the

frequent references to thinly potted specimens among the principal
Sung wares. Almost all of the existing examples are of a thick
and rather heavy type. Not that we would have them thinner, for
much of their charm is due to the massive opulence of the thick
opalescent glaze with its prismatic depths and changing hues. But

the Chinese writers constantly refer to a thinner ware as well as

the thick. Where are these thin and elegant pieces ? The sug-
gestion that, being more fragile, they have by now all perished
has been coldly received as an obvious and easy answer to a diffi-
cult question. But it is reasonable enough, after all, when one
remembers that upwards of a thousand years have passed since
their manufacture. The alternative that they existed only in the

poetical imagination of later Chinese writers is far less probable,

though doubtless account must be taken of the exaggerations in-

dulged in by men who were describing the ideal wares of a classic

period. " Thin as paper," for instance, must have been a poetic

licence as applied to the Ch'ai ware. I shall not cite the illus-

trations in the Album of Hsiang Yiian-p'ien ^ as proof of the fine-

ness and trim regularity of the best Sung specimens. Whatever

the value of this manuscript may originally have been, no reliance

can be placed on the illustrations as reproduced in Porcelain of

Di^erent Dynasties." The original was unfortunately destroyed by
A^ late sixteenth-centurj^ work, published with translations by Dr. S. ^Y. Bushell»

1908, under the title of Porcelain of Different Dynasties.
* I have already had occasion to criticise the inconsistencies in the colouring, etc.

of this work. See Burlington Magazine, April, 1909, p, 23.