Part 11

Sometimes, as with the mirror-knobs, a little painting of shepherds and shepherdesses is set in the lid, and, with the jewelled and enamelled border, form a trifle dainty enough to rival any modern bonbonnières. These patch-boxes and “Gum Patches,” or “Patches for ladies,” or “Face Patches,” were advertised freely in American newspapers for many years previous to the Revolution—as early, surely, as 1750 in the _Boston Evening Post_; and patches were universally worn by American beauties, as Whitefield and other pious travellers sadly deplored. “China Snuff Boxes” were offered for sale in the _Boston Evening Post_ of April 16, 1773, were bought and filled with Kippen’s snuff, were lost on Boston streets, were advertised for reward in Boston papers, and no doubt proudly and ostentatiously carried by Boston beaux, as well as by Charleston macaronis. A few snuff-boxes of Battersea enamel still remain to show us how lovely they were, but the frail china ones have nearly all been destroyed, and when still existing are usually sadly cracked and disfigured. China and Battersea enamel “tooth-pick cases” were also imported and carried by Boston beaux.

But we must leave these dainty quaint trinkets and go back to the far less beautiful Liverpool pitchers. Though they have no great charm of color, shape, or design, and are, in fact, the least graceful and beautiful of all the old English wares commonly found in America, all the historical pitchers must certainly be of great interest to students of American history, as records and relics of the early days of the United States. As new pieces bearing hitherto unknown designs are constantly being found, they will form, in fact do now form, with the old blue Staffordshire plates, a valuable and lasting ceramic record of the early days of our nation. Let us hope that they will be carefully preserved by all who are fortunate enough to own them; and, if they are not placed in the safe keeping of museums or cabinet collections, at least be kept from the debasing uses and positions in which I have seen them in country homes. My patriotic heart has thrilled with wounded indignation to see mugs and pitchers bearing such honored and venerated names and faces, battered, nicked, and handleless, despitefully used to hold herb-teas, soft-soap, horse-liniment, or tooth-brushes. I saw one Washington pitcher, noseless and fairly crenated with nicks, shamefully degraded to use as a jug to carry to the hen-house the hot water with which to prepare the chicken-food; while another contained a villainous-looking purple-black liquid compound which the owner explained was “Pa’s hair-restorer.” In spite of careless use, however, many specimens still exist, for “antique” dealers find them for their shops. In one Newport bric-a-brac shop I saw, in the summer of 1891, at least fifteen Liverpool pitchers varying in price from five dollars for a small Sailor pitcher to thirty-five dollars for a fine perfect Apotheosis Pitcher.

Fortunate is the household, and happy and proud should be its members, that possesses one of these historic relics. I know of no better way to impress upon a child, or to recall to a grown person, the lesson of bravery, courage, and love of country, than by showing him the likenesses of Perry, Decatur, and Lawrence on mug or pitcher, and telling to him their story, and reading or reciting the old ballads and songs written about them. Nor do I know of any more noble example of Christian piety than that of the brave Macdonough, whose name is so often seen on these pieces of old English ware. Before the battle of Lake Champlain, when the deck of the Saratoga was cleared for action, he knelt upon the deck with his officers and men around him, asked Almighty God for aid, and committed the issue of the contest into His hands. Let us echo the toast which was given to him at a large dinner in Plattsburg, shortly after his victory. “The pious and brave Macdonough, the professor of the religion of the Redeemer—preparing for action, he called on God, who forsook him not in the hour of danger. _May he not be forgotten by his country._”

Let our respect and affection for our ancestors’ adored heroes save to our descendants the Liverpool pitchers bearing such honored historical names.

VIII. ORIENTAL CHINA

In that delightful and much-quoted book, “The China Hunters’ Club,” the final chapter is devoted to a most humorous description of the disbandment and ignominious extinction of the club through a fierce quarrel over a disputed piece of china—whether it were Chinese or Lowestoft. Could I, as did Charlie Baker in that story, label both my china of like character and this chapter “Canton-Lowestoft,” it would fitly express my feelings when I attempt to judge and write upon the old pieces of hard-paste porcelain, so common in America, called Oriental, Canton, India, or Lowestoft, according to the belief or traditions of each individual owner. I cannot give any positive rules by which to classify this china, nor any by which to judge of independent specimens. If I followed my own convictions and my own researches on this puzzling subject, I should in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred firmly state the disputed piece of porcelain to be Chinese, and I could quote in support of my views such an authority as Franks, the great china collector, who says that,

“India china (that is, china made for the East India Company for European trade—what Jacquemart calls _porcelaine des Indes_) has on one hand been attributed to Japan, and on the other, by a still more singular hallucination been ascribed to Lowestoft.”

He also says, “There can be no doubt that there was a considerable manufactory of porcelain at Lowestoft, but this was of the usual English soft-paste. The evidence of hard-paste having been made there is of the most slender kind.”

Mr. Owens, in his “Two Centuries of Ceramic Art in Bristol,” says, with decision:

“There cannot be any doubt that hard porcelain, vitrified and translucent, was never manufactured from the raw materials, native kaolin and petunste, at any other locality in England than Plymouth and Bristol. The tradition that such ware was made at Lowestoft in 1775 rests upon evidence too slight to be worthy of argument. The East India Company imported into England large quantities of porcelain for sale; and in the provincial journals of the last century advertisements of sales by auction of East India china occur frequently. This particular ware, which is very plentiful, even at the present day, and which has of late acquired the reputation of having been made at Lowestoft, was simply, in form and ornamentation, only a reproduction by the Chinese of English earthenware models. The Chinese do not use saucers, butter-boats, and numbers of other articles after the European fashion, and the agents in China were compelled to furnish a model for every piece of ware ordered. These models the Asiatic workmen have copied only too faithfully. The ill-drawn roses, the coarsely painted baskets of flowers, the rude borders of lines and dots are literally copied from the inartistic painting on the English earthenware of by-gone days.”

He also says, “It is painful to see in public and private collections examples of Oriental ware labelled Lowestoft, simply because, though hard porcelain, they bear English armorial coats and initials. Many porcelain punch-bowls are to be found in seaport towns with names and portraits of ships and very early dates. Those bowls are often attributed to the works at Liverpool and Lowestoft. The officers of the East India Company’s ships were accustomed to take out English Delft bowls and get them reproduced in common porcelain in China for their merchant friends, and many a relic now prized as of home manufacture was procured in this manner.”

Mr. Prime writes more cautiously, after describing the pieces:

“These are supposed to have been made on special patterns furnished to the Oriental factories by the East India Company. They resemble European work in the decoration, and many of the Lowestoft paintings seem to be imitations of these. It is, therefore, necessary to be very cautious in classifying wares as of Lowestoft fabric.”

And again he says, “The presence of a single decoration like a flower or sprig of flowers in European style on porcelain is not a sufficient reason for classing the porcelain as European. Many such pieces were printed in Japan and in China. And others are possibly the work of decorators in Holland.”

Mr. Elliott says of Lowestoft in America:

“It seems certain that this kind of decoration was done at Lowestoft; it is equally certain that it was also done in China, from designs sent out there. I have myself seen pieces so decorated which were imported direct from China to New Haven about the end of the last century.”

On the other hand, that standard authority, Mr. Chaffers, author of “Marks and Monograms,” says that “the question about hard-paste porcelain having been made at Lowestoft is placed beyond dispute upon the best authority. It was introduced about 1773,” and he offers a mass of testimony to prove his statements.

Mr. Owens fancies that sailing-masters took out English Delft bowls to be reproduced in China; Mr. Marryatt and Mr. Franks, that Chinese porcelain was imported to Holland and painted in Delft; another collector believes that Chinese kaolin and clay were brought to Lowestoft, and there mixed, shaped, fired and painted; and still another, that Lowestoft porcelain was taken out to China to be decorated. The Catalogue of the Museum of Practical Geology in London very shrewdly and non-responsibly says of its Lowestoft specimens: “It should be understood that several of the following pieces are exhibited as ‘Lowestoft china’ simply in deference to the opinions of certain collectors and not as authenticated specimens.”

To show the doubtful eyes with which the Lowestoft aspirants are regarded by authorities in England, I will state that in this last-mentioned catalogue but twelve lots of Lowestoft porcelain and pottery are named—a small proportion—and a sharp lesson to American collectors with their reckless and sweeping Lowestoft classifications. None of the twelve bear any distinguishing Lowestoft marks or names. The descriptions of some of these are not at all like our American Lowestoft wares. One reads: “Two plates ornamented with borders in brown and gold, and with views of a Suffolk village and river painted in sepia in a circular panel in centre of each plate.”

From these few extracts which I have taken from various authorities, it is plainly seen that no decision, no judgment can be given in this Lowestoft case, that each seeker after china and truth must judge for himself.

The history of the production of hard-paste china at Lowestoft is exceedingly curious as an example and proof of the suddenness with which recent facts and circumstances may be forgotten. It seems fairly incredible that the true particulars of the manufacture of this ware (which it is alleged was produced in such great quantities from the year 1775 to 1803) should be entirely lost and forgotten in half a century’s time. The descriptions and history of Lowestoft china in Mr. Llewellyn Jewitt’s article in the July number of the _London Art Journal_ in 1863, were the first to call attention to Lowestoft china, and I still consider him the best and most trustworthy authority on the subject. Previous to that time, in the catalogues of English Loan Collections and Museums, the name even of Lowestoft does not appear, though the ware was seen everywhere labelled vaguely “Foreign,” or “Oriental.” At a later date Mr. Chaffers’s book appeared with a warm endorsement and enthusiastic setting-forth of the Lowestoft factory and its wares, so warm and embracing in its description that Mr. Jewitt in his later book, “Ceramic Art in Great Britain,” fairly has to protest against such broad sweeping into the Lowestoft net; and he must feel that he “builded better than he knew” when he “wrote up” the Lowestoft factory. He says: “Let me utter a word or two of caution to collectors against placing too implicit a reliance upon what has been written concerning Lowestoft china, and against taking for granted that all which is nowadays called Lowestoft china is really the production of that manufactory. If all that is ascribed to Lowestoft was ever made there the works must have been the most extensive, and—if all the varieties of wares that are now said to have been produced there were made it is asserted simultaneously—the most extraordinary on record. The great bulk of the specimens now unblushingly ascribed to Lowestoft I believe never were in that town, much less ever made there.”

When Mr. Jewitt wrote thus he knew nothing about the vast additional stock of Lowestoft in America, enough additional weight to swamp forever the Lowestoft pretensions. Mr. Jewitt also resented with proper indignation some criticisms which Mr. Chaffers dared to make upon his _Art Journal_ paper, saying, with truth, that he (Chaffers) was indebted to him for nearly every scrap of information about the Lowestoft factory that he has embodied in his work. He might say for every scrap of any importance. The three accounts form a typical example of the controversies in private life, of the minor disputes that always arise among china collectors, not only over the claims of the Lowestoft factory, but over even a single piece of Lowestoft hard-paste porcelain.

The specimens of what are called Lowestoft ware that are most frequently seen in America, are parts of tea-services, punch-bowls and pitchers, coffee-pots and mugs. The pieces often bear crests, coats of arms, or initials. Shields supported with birds, and escutcheons in dark blue are also frequent. The initials are usually very gracefully interlaced. Sometimes the tea-caddy will bear the crest or coat of arms with the initials, while the remainder of the tea-service will have the initials only.

On many of the pieces the border is of clear cobalt blue (often in rich enamel), varied with gold stars or a meander pattern in gold. Some unreasoning collectors take their stand upon this blue and gold-starred border as being the only positive indication and proof to their minds that the piece thus decorated is truly Lowestoft; but I have seen many pieces that were positively imported directly from China to America that bore this Lowestoft border. A red trellis-border and a peculiar russet-brown or chocolate border also abound on these disputed pieces, and the scale pattern in purplish pink. A raised border of vine leaves, grapes, flowers and squirrels is seen on the beakers; I have found both this form and decoration rare in America.

When a flower pattern appears on Lowestoft china the rose predominates. Chaffers says that the reason for this use of the rose is twofold; the arms of the English borough in which the china is said to have been manufactured or painted, is the Tudor, or full-blown rose surmounted by an open crown; and the cleverest painter of Lowestoft ware was Thomas Rose, and he thus commemorated his name. He was a French refugee, and it is to his French taste we owe the delicate style of whatever flower ornamentation appears on this china. It is sad to read that he became blind and spent the last days of his life as a water-vender, plying his trade with two donkeys that had been given him by the town. The pieces alleged to have been painted by him, and indeed all the Lowestoft pieces, were seldom profuse in decoration. Roses without foliage or stems, little bouquets, or narrow festoons of tiny roses with green leaves, were his favorite designs. Often a piece bore only a single rose.

The mugs and tea and coffee-pots usually have twisted or double handles crossed and fastened to the main body of the piece with raised leaves or flowers. The large pieces, such as punch-bowls and pitchers and the helmet creamers, sometimes have an irregular surface, as if, when in the paste, they had been patted into shape by the hands. I have often seen this appearance also on blue and white undoubted Chinese ware. The mugs are both cylindrical and barrel-shaped; the cups are handleless, as are usually the cups of all Oriental china manufactured at that date.

Mr. Chaffers says that occasionally the smaller pieces of Lowestoft will be seen embossed with the rice-pattern or basket-work. I have never seen a piece thus embossed but was as plainly and unmistakably Oriental as a Chinaman’s pigtail and his almond eyes.

The oval teapot shown on page 208 is a typical Lowestoft piece, though not a choice one; and by many ignorant collectors all teapots of that particular shape, with twisted handles held to the body with embossed leaves, no matter with what other decoration, are firmly assigned to the Lowestoft factory. Many unmistakably Chinese pieces, however, are seen in this exact shape; for instance, a beautiful rice-pattern teapot in the Avery Collection, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This piece is rich in gold and blue, but has the knobs, twisted handles, and embossed leaves of the Lowestoft pattern. Perhaps, in spite of its Chinese rice-pattern, and the quality of the paste, Chaffers would class it as Lowestoft.

There are found in America certain Oriental vases of typical Lowestoft decoration which are usually in one or the other of two shapes, cylindrical with suddenly flaring top (or rarely an ovoid cylinder with similar top), or a vase with small base, sharply bulging out at half its height, and as suddenly contracting to a small neck. These vases, in sets or garnitures of three or five pieces, the two end vases always alike, graced the mantel of many a “parlour” a century ago, and were frequently decorated with initials or coats of arms. Such are the beautifully-shaped vases with exquisite blue, brown, and gold decoration, given by Lafayette to Cadwallader Jones of Petersburg, Va., one of which is here shown. These vases exhibit the impressed basket-work design; they are in perfect preservation, and have recently come by gift into the possession of the Washington Association of New Jersey.

There are in English collections a few specimens of the early soft-paste Lowestoft manufactures, which were always decorated in blue, which bear Lowestoft names or distinguishing dates. Indeed, these blue and white pieces are the only ones that do have designating Lowestoft marks, or bear dates, which seems to me a very significant fact. I have never found any of these blue and white Lowestoft pieces in America, either marked or unmarked, nor do I know of any marked Lowestoft pieces in any American collection. There are none in the Trumbull-Prime Collection. I have seen a few rather coarse blue and white Delft-ware pieces which I suspect might be classed as Lowestoft.

I fear that in this attempt to throw light, or rather borrow light, on the Lowestoft question, I have not succeeded very well, and have perhaps cast a deeper shadow. There is one other condition which has influenced and helped me to form my condition of mind about Lowestoft china, and that is the situation of the town. It is the absolute “Land’s end,” the extreme eastern point of England; the sand and some of the clay necessary to make all this porcelain would have had to be transported from the extreme western “Land’s end” of Cornwall, and the great supply of coal to burn in the kilns, from the extreme northern coast of Northumberland and Durham—two most inconvenient and expensive contingencies. It was, however, near to Holland, that great producer of Delft-ware, and had an extensive trade with that country, and Dutch vessels constantly entered the Lowestoft port. And the first productions—the only marked and dated ones—are all blue and white and resemble Delft-ware: none are of porcelain. The Dutch also were great importers of Oriental china. Of course we must believe that some china also came out of Lowestoft, but these are some of the very bewildering accompanying conditions that we cannot crowd out of our minds.

It is difficult to assign prices or values to pieces of Lowestoft china, for, as in other wares, the quality of the decoration, of course, influences the price. Teapots similar to the one shown on page 208 are often offered for from four to eight dollars—one sold in the Governor Lyon sale in 1876 for $5. At that same sale Lowestoft plates of ordinary design, with single rose decoration, brought $1.50 each; cups and saucers of similar design, the same price. A pretty dish of gold and buff, with brownish bird in the centre, brought $3. A helmet creamer, with decoration of grapes and vines in gold and brown, brought $4; this is a decoration and shape frequently seen in America. One bearing the Morse coat of arms is here shown. One very curious piece, a custard-cup belonging to a “marriage set,” sold for $6.50. This cup was decorated with festoons and bunches of roses, and on one side was a hand holding two medallions, with initials, tied together with a lovers’ knot of ribbon, with the motto “Unit.” On the other side were two coats of arms held and supported in the same manner. It is said that this idea of a marriage set was in high fashion a hundred years ago. At the S. L. M. Barlow sale in New York, in February, 1890, the prices of Lowestoft pieces were higher—partly because the specimens were better. A sugar-box with blue and gold ribbon decoration sold for $5, teapots for $8 and $10.

A device found on Lowestoft pieces is very common in America—or at any rate, in New England—and is frequently and erroneously supposed to be an armorial bearing. It is a monogram or cipher written within an oval or an escutcheon, backed by an ermine mantle, surmounted by a wreath on which are perched a pair of doves. This device was doubtless sent to China to be painted on a service as a wedding gift, and proving popular was often repeated. I have seen it on many pieces in many families, in gold and various colors, the monogram or initial only being different. A letter is in existence, written by a gentleman in China in 1810, to a fair bride in Hartford, saying that he sends to her as a wedding gift a set of porcelain with this decoration. Portions of the set are still owned by the bride’s descendants. This of course proves the device to have been painted in China. Perhaps it was painted in England also, but I doubt it.

There is a very pretty Lowestoft design which I have seen upon dinner- and tea-sets belonging to several families in New England, which may have been made specially for the American market, or at any rate must have been sent here in large quantities. It consists of the American shield and eagle in shades of brown touched with gold, with a pretty delicate border of the same colors, and tiny dots of vermilion. I speak specially of this design because it is often offered for sale as “George Washington’s China,” on the slight foundation, I suppose, of having upon it an American shield and eagle; and not only offered but sold, and no doubt exhibited with pride by collectors of Washingtoniana. One lucky dog of a relic hunter recently secured in New York a “Washington” teapot with this design for the sum of $75—a paltry amount, as he considered it. There are a number of pieces bearing this decoration in the Trumbull-Prime Collection, a portion of a set belonging to a member of Mr. Prime’s family. A coffee-pot of the set is here shown. This service was purchased in England in 1804. The gilt lettering on it, as on others that I have seen, is much worn, while the decoration is in perfect condition.