Manufactories rapidly sprung up in other French towns—at Niederviller, where German kaolin was used; at several places in Paris; at Bordeaux, Clignancourt, Lille, Valenciennes, Vincennes, Limoges, and elsewhere. Fauquez made porcelain at Valenciennes in 1785, and the works were taken by Lamoninary in 1787. Hannong was employed at Vincennes in 1786, and marked his pieces with two pipes crossed, with or without the letter H. The industry was afterward protected by the Duke of Chartres, when the monogram L. P. was adopted as the mark.
The porcelain of Limoges is probably better known in this country than any other, through the enterprise of the makers, whose works in faience have already arrested our attention. The proximity of Limoges to St. Yrieix would alone lead us to view it as an important centre. After the discovery of kaolin, the brothers Grellet, Massié, and Fourniera established a porcelain workshop in 1773. The mark C. D. occurs on many remarkable works. In 1784 the manufactory was absorbed by Sèvres, Gabriel Grellet acting as director.{321} The paste was then very pure and white, but deteriorated; and Alluaud succeeded Grellet in 1788. Another change was made in 1793, and the works were again carried on as a private enterprise in the hands of MM. Joubert and Cancate. In 1794 the convent at Limoges was converted into a manufactory, and another rose in 1798, in the hands of the elder Alluaud, who was succeeded by his son. Though highly commendable in purity of glaze and compactness and whiteness of paste, his porcelain was inferior in decoration. The next we hear of Limoges is through David Haviland, of New York, who went from this country to Limoges upward of forty years ago. His firm worked steadily in the manufacture of porcelain, chiefly of a domestic character, before they conjoined it with that of faience.
At the present time Haviland & Co. make a domestic ware of exceptional purity and of great{322} beauty of design. One set is modelled after and decorated with the water-lily, and others are of equal simplicity and beauty. The rule in these and in more strictly ornamental pieces is, to follow a chaste and refined style, marked by a limited use of color. The rule we laid down for the decoration of porcelain—that it should never be loaded with colors less beautiful than its own glaze—is here more closely followed than anywhere else occurring to us. Here, for example, is a set of plates painted with different scenes, such as a snow-storm, morning, night, before a shower, during a shower, and other similar subjects. The details are not wrought in with obtrusive precision. Something is left to imagination, and the effect of every view is perfect. They are painted by M. Bracquemond.
We nowhere find a better successor to the “egg-shell” of China than in the delicate, pure, and fragile specimens of thin porcelain from Limoges. This is an exceptional fabric, but there is elsewhere to be seen enough to substantiate the excellence of French porcelain for domestic use, in point of both beauty and strength. We have seen certain small coffee-cups so finely wrought, exquisitely modelled, and chastely colored, that when not in use they might serve as ornaments. The point to which painting on porcelain has been brought is further illustrated by a series of dessert{323} plates ornamented with different kinds of fruit—grapes, peaches, and other varieties. The supreme delicacy with which the requisite tints are here applied is admirable. On others are different kinds of seaweed and other marine objects, in which the artist has caught the natural hues with wonderful precision. The porcelain vases are, as a rule, small in size. No attempt, so far as we are aware, has been made to follow the gigantic works of Sèvres, Meissen, and Berlin, and we do not regret the fact. The works with which we are presented show great skill in the colors obtained, and the shapes are simple and sometimes severe. The domestic porcelain of Limoges deserves careful study for the sake of the refined taste which it invariably reflects.
Fig. 277.—Dinner-set in Limoges Pate Tendre.
The most highly artistic pieces are in pate tendre, or artificial paste. Considering the difficulty of manipulating the body and its liability to sink in the furnace, many of the old Sèvres pieces must be regarded as marvels of workmanship. We look with a similar interest upon the examples coming to us from Limoges. It has the honor of having produced the only complete dinner-set ever made of this ware (Fig. 277). Its beauty is parallel with its value, which we hardly dare estimate. Beautifully modelled and plumaged birds form the dish handles, and a simple accessory decoration on the body reveals to perfection the peculiar appearance presented by pate tendre of having the colors sunk in the soft and creamy glaze.
Haviland & Co. have attained an exceptional success in colors. A complete toilet-set of pate tendre is turquoise blue of great richness and transparent depth. The modelling corresponds with an{324} achievement in color which has been the despair of ceramic artists for centuries. Deck is the only French maker who, before the Havilands, approached the old turquoise of China. The art has long been lost in the East. Deck’s pieces, however, are apt to craze or crack in irregular breaks, and this was thought to be unavoidable until Haviland made crackle closely resembling in color the rare old Chinese. Of the same material are two recumbent Psyches (Fig. 278), one in blue, the other in pink. In no more poetic form do we remember to have met the winged nymph who turned against Cupid the darts with which he was wont to afflict humanity. A set of three graceful vases (Fig. 279) with reticulated necks, and each supported on a tripod of goats’ feet, is painted in blue, gold, and pink. The forms are graceful and the coloring refined. The paintings of Poitevin and Du Liege on these and other pieces are characterized by the most exquisite delicacy. M. Pallandre, the Parisian flower-painter, has also lent to the porcelain of Haviland & Co. the beauty conferred by his dexterous brush.
Fig. 278.—Psyche, in Blue Pate Tendre.
An excellent domestic ware, also made at Limoges, is largely imported by the manufacturers, Charles Field Haviland & Co., of New York. The greater portion of it is undecorated; but lately the makers have been turning their attention to decoration, and artistic work of considerable merit now comes from their establishment.
Before leaving France, the names of Deck, Solon, and Regnault may be allowed to stay our progress. The Messrs. Deck, of Paris, have, as we have seen, made a special study of color, and were the first, or among the first, to revive Oriental decoration. Their Persian ware, or imitation of the old art of Persia, is characterized by much of the beauty of the original. Their blue, as we have seen, is especially commendable, and enabled them to compete with the enterprising imitators of England, the Mintons, who have for several years been in possession of a blue very little inferior to the turquoise. It is to be regretted that Deck was not represented at the Centennial Exhibition, where, by the richness of his palette, he would have had an opportunity of extending his reputation in America.
M. Regnault, who succeeded M. Ebelman in the directorate of{326} Sèvres, was the inventor, while at the Sèvres manufactory, of pate changeante. The ware appears, during the day, like gray céladon, and at night, under artificial light, changes to a beautiful pink, whence its name.
The name of M. Solon recalls at once the peculiar style of decoration called “Pate-sur-pate,” or paste upon paste. The process has been long known in China, and was first attempted in Europe by M. Ebelman at Sèvres about thirty years ago. The experiments were successful, and some very fine works were issued. The process was taken to England from Sèvres by M. Solon, who was engaged a few years ago by the Messrs. Minton (Fig. 282). In Mr. A. B. Daniells’s collection at the Centennial Exhibition, some examples of pate-sur-pate by M. Solon attracted general attention. There were two pairs of vases of a pure Greek shape, with a body of a rich bronze or chocolate color. On this, in white relief, were figures symbolizing Fire and Water, and a group of the Graces accompanied by Cupid in a race. The forms were exquisitely drawn, and were half revealed by the semi-transparent drapery. More usual grounds are a dark green and a grayish tint, either of which has a soft effect. A second specimen is given at Fig. 352.
This method of treatment consists in applying to the surface to be decorated white liquid porcelain as a pigment. The application is repeated until the necessary relief is obtained, when the figures are finished by carving or scraping. Repeated firings are necessary before glazing, and the decoration, which is opaque while wet, becomes more or less transparent, according to the thickness of the pigment. The process is one of the nicest and most difficult in the entire range of ceramic art, as a mistake once made cannot be remedied, and the glaze has a tendency to destroy the fine outlines of the figures.{327}
CHAPTER VI.
GERMANY AND CENTRAL EUROPE.
Early Pottery.—Lake Dwellers.—Early German.—Peculiar Shapes.—How Peasants Account for Relics.—Roman Epoch.—Tin Enamel.—Leipsic.—Breslau.—Nuremberg.—The Hirschvogels.—Villengen.—Höchst.—Marburg.—Bavaria.—Switzerland.—Belgium.—Delft.
THE early pottery of Germany and Central Europe dates from the Stone Age down to the Roman incursion, when the types change, and the evidences of more perfect mechanical appliances become apparent. The Lake Dwellers, who built their huts on piles in the lakes of Switzerland, have commemorated themselves by hand-wrought vessels, to the embellishment of which a decoration of the rudest kind was brought. Remains have been found throughout Germany, of which some are hand-made, while others are evidently thrown upon the wheel. These are both pre-Roman and contemporaneous with the Roman occupation. The paste varies from a friable clay to a hard, ringing stone-ware. Vases of a great variety of shape have been found along with cups, plates, saucers, and jars. Some of the vases are divided, like boxes, into compartments. The ornaments are paintings, mouldings, and incised lines. The painting consists of parallel lines of red, yellow, and black. Some of the smaller pieces were apparently used as toys. Others, of a sepulchral character, are thought to resemble the huts of the lacustrine dwellers. One found at Achersleben has a tall, conical cover, like a high-thatched roof, and the orifice in front is covered with a plate having a ring in the centre, through which a pin being passed fastened it on the outside. The orifice was in this way closed after the ashes of the dead had been introduced (Fig. 283). These and similar remains have been found in various parts of Germany, and have given rise to many superstitious stories among the peasantry. By some they are said to be the natural{328} produce of the soil. Others ascribe them to the all-powerful fairies. Others consider them possessed of wonderful preservative properties. As to the art they represent, we are convinced here, as we are in a parallel manner, though more forcibly amidst the remains belonging to ancient Gaul, that the Romans were not the first to inspire the Teutonic population with a desire for the expression of artistic ideas. We find both an awakening sensitiveness to the graces of form, and a growing appreciation of the possible beauty of surface decoration.
Fig. 283.—Ancient German Hut-shaped Vases.
With the Romans we find pottery both made on the spots where they settled and imported from the seats of the ceramic industry in Italy. These display the usual Roman characteristics, and need not be here considered. Crossing the Dark Ages, we find, in the thirteenth century, Germany in possession of processes for the presence of which—so far removed from their accepted centres and from the regular routes by which they travelled—it might be hard to account if it were absolutely necessary to travel by the regular route. We have seen this already in the case of early France. We see it again in Germany. Possibly the Romans may have taught their barbarian subjects something about glazing. Possibly some wanderer to Palestine and the East or to the Saracenic settlements in the South of Europe, or some stranger from these “foreign parts,” may have initiated the German potters in the higher secrets of the art.{329}
In any event, Germany was making enamelled faience at least two centuries before Luca della Robbia had perfected his process in Italy. A potter of Schelestadt, in Alsace, is said by the Germans to have discovered tin enamel. Even his name is now forgotten, although his death is said to have occurred in 1283. At Leipsic is a glazed frieze, dated 1207, and at Breslau, in 1230, architectural reliefs of great excellence were produced. Two hundred years later, in 1441, Veit Hirschvogel was using stanniferous enamel. At Strehla, in 1565, the potters were so well skilled in the working of terra-cotta, that they had made a pulpit of that material. One is almost led by these facts to question if Germany did not lead both Italy and France, and to regret that the history of German ceramics has not been more fully opened up to us. One danger let us guard against, for the sake of securing the intelligent understanding of Germany, incompatible with either partiality or prejudice. We need not confound conservative tastes with a “very slow march of ideas.” One rather loves to find an artist so impressed with what is good in his own art, that he is in no haste to leave it in order to catch the first whiff of foreign inspiration. Ideas evidently circulated at a tolerably high rate of speed in a country where the enamelled friezes and monumental bas-reliefs of Leipsic and Breslau existed in the beginning of the thirteenth century.
To Leipsic, therefore, Germany is indebted for its first enamelled ware. The friezes above mentioned consisted of tiles with alto-relievo heads of Christ and the Apostles. The enamel is dark green. What occurs to us at once is that no art ever began with such works, and that in them we have the successful results of long experiment.
Breslau is made famous by a large work of the same century, representing Henry IV. of Silesia, who died in 1290. The monarch lies stretched upon a tomb surrounded by twenty-one bas-reliefs.
The Hirschvogels of Nuremberg have thrown a lustre upon their birthplace by their faience decorated with enamelled reliefs. The founder of the family, Veit Hirschvogel, was born in 1441, and died in 1525; and one of his sons, Augustine, has left some very artistic works in the prevailing style of ornamentation, with medallions and decorations in relief. One vase has green dragon handles (Fig. 284); and the fact that this style existed in Nuremberg at the time when Palissy was travelling in Germany, has led to the supposition that he{330} may have acquired the rudiments of his art under Hirschvogel. The same city was deservedly celebrated for its tiles ornamented with bas-reliefs, generally of the deep green distinctive of the greater proportion of German pottery. The style was at a later period carried to a greater extent, as we find upon different vessels several animal forms in high relief, and even the vessels themselves modelled after the animals of the country.
At Villingen, in the Black Forest, Hans Kraut, who died in 1590, carried the same branch of art to great perfection, his tiles and bas-reliefs marking him as a successful and talented disciple of the school of Nuremberg.
Höchst and Marburg were both important seats of the industry, and at the former we find a vase having its neck ornamented with white reliefs, like the cameos of Wedgwood. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the industry was established in many places throughout Germany, and styles of western and southern origin make their appearance. The faience of Anspach, Bavaria, follows the style of Rouen, and at Nuremberg, in the eighteenth century, the early Faentine style is making itself felt. The Bavarian towns of Göggingen and Baireuth both produced pieces of great beauty and refinement. On some from the former appear bouquets, birds, and arabesques, and one from the latter is ornamented—with what delicacy of effect may be imagined—with a figure and medallion surrounded by blue arabesques laid upon the white enamel. Before the middle of the eighteenth century Nuremberg had instituted its modern style, blue arabesque borders on a bluish glaze surrounding centre-pieces of fruit, etc.
SWITZERLAND.
In Switzerland we know Zürich, Schaffhausen, Winterthur, and one or two other places. Of these, Winterthur is probably the more{331} ancient, pieces occurring dated 1678 and 1689. The styles are akin to the Italian—deep-bordered dishes with regularly arranged groups of fruit or flowers, or blue arabesques running round the margin. Escutcheons or fortified castles form the centre decoration. Precision and stiff, scrupulous care characterize the drawing.
BELGIUM.
Belgium, in at least two of the seats of its ceramic wares, has been closely allied with France. From Antwerp, the great centre of Belgian art, issued majolica of Italian styles in blue and yellow, violet and green, and another quality after the Oriental porcelain patterns. Toward the middle of the seventeenth century, if not earlier, Antwerp was in close relations with France. Tournay was of French origin in so far as its faience is concerned, and it was not until its workshop passed into the hands of Peterynck, of Lille, that it rose to eminence. The pieces attributed to it show a compound of Rouennais, Flemish, and Chinese decoration. Brussels had carried the art in 1761 to such a height, that its faience was said to be preferable to that of Delft and Rouen, with which it is possible it may sometimes be confounded by collectors. At Tervueren, near the capital, some pieces still in existence were made which are decorated with wreaths and bouquets and armorial bearings executed in colors of moderate purity.
HOLLAND.
Fig. 285.—Delft Blue-and-white. Eighteenth Century. Chinese Style. Height, 17½ in. (Mrs. John V. L. Pruyn Coll.)
For our present purpose, all Holland may be said to be comprised in the single town of Delft. Its works date from 1310, and may be divided into two eras, that preceding the making of “porcelain,” and that during and after the fabrication miscalled by that name. The Delft faience is thin and hard, and was decorated with landscapes and scenes by the best painters of the time. It was made into{332} tiles, large plaques, baskets, vases, statuettes, and many other forms. Toward the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth centuries, when the Dutch were laying the foundation of their trade with Japan, the fine quality of faience, which has never been equalled by any other country, began to be produced. We find this imitation of Oriental porcelain officially recognized in 1614, and for a hundred and fifty years it was currently referred to as porcelain. In reality it was a fine faience, modelled and decorated after the peculiar forms and patterns with which their trade with Japan had made the Dutch almost exclusively familiar. The paste, which consisted chiefly of the clay of Bruyelle, near Tournay, was skilfully mixed with sand and carefully manipulated. The sand made it hard, and gave it a capacity for being wrought into thin pieces suitable for table services. The bluish enamel was perfectly smooth and even; and the decoration, chiefly in blue and iron-red, after the Oriental designs, imparted to it much of the appearance of Japanese porcelain.
Fig. 286.—Delft Blue-and-white. Eighteenth Century. Size, 21 in. by 18 in. (Mrs. John V. L. Pruyn Coll.)
It is not to be wondered at that, as the processes were perfected, the reputation of Delft increased, and its commerce grew in proportion, and that no symptoms of decay manifest themselves until toward the end of the seventeenth century. The genius of both potters and painters ran riot among curious forms and decorations. One author mentions dinner services with dish covers resembling in form and{333} color the birds to be served in them; a spice cupboard resembling a Chinese Mandarin, and other curiosities. Another strange form was that of a violin, one of which is painted in blue camaïeu, with figures engaged in a dance, and musicians.
STONE-WARE.
Countess Jacqueline.—Teylingen.—Graybeards.—Fine Stone-ware.—Grès de Flandre.—Creussen.
This ware, distinguished, as we have seen, by its vitrified fracture, although long known in the East, does not appear in Europe until between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries. When it was first made in France has not been ascertained with sufficient exactness, and to Germany the credit of instituting the fabrication has generally been accorded. We find it throughout the provinces on the Rhine at a very early period, and it probably passed down the Rhine to Holland and thence to England.
The name of the beautiful and unfortunate Jacqueline of Bavaria, Countess of Hainault and Holland, is connected with the making of stone-ware by a very curious tradition. Jacqueline was the daughter of William IV., Count of Hainault and Holland, at whose request she married John, Duke of Brabant. This was the beginning of her troubles. A jealous and disappointed suitor, John of Bavaria, Bishop of Liege, marched against Holland, and having compelled the countess to nominate him as her successor, bribed her husband to transfer to him the management of her estates for a term of years. The countess, having good reason to be disgusted with men in general, and with her husband and quondam suitor in particular, fled to England after appealing in vain to Rome for a divorce. In England her beauty captivated the Duke of Gloucester, who espoused her cause as a preliminary to espousing herself. The duke marched against her husband of Brabant, who, assisted by his cousin of Burgundy, defeated the invader. Gloucester deserted Jacqueline, fled to England, and took a less involved bride. The countess in the mean time was imprisoned; but she escaped, and on the death, in 1425, of the prelate of Liege, resumed her rightful position. Then she was relieved by death of her husband,{334} and was again involved in war by the Duke of Burgundy, whom she was forced to declare her heir. A second marriage into which she entered so enraged Philip—who, by-the-way, is known in history as, par excellence, “The Good”—that he arrested her husband, and would have executed him, had not Jacqueline handed over her coveted property to “The Good,” and in 1433 retired to the privacy of the Castle of Teylingen. Three years afterward she died, at the age of thirty-six.
From what we can make out, the countess was twice an occupant of Teylingen, once in 1424, on escaping from imprisonment at Ghent, and the second time, as above mentioned, in 1433. On both these occasions she appears to have occupied herself with the superintendence of the stone-ware works, and even with fashioning the vessels with her own dainty hands. After they were made, we are told—although it is altogether incredible—that the flagons were thrown into the Rhine, either as mementos of her imprisonment, or “that they might in after-ages be deemed works of antiquity.” Providing for posterity in that peculiar manner does not commend itself to one’s reason, as in any way in keeping with the career of the Countess Jacqueline. There was a custom in Paris for patriotic citizens to assemble in the gardens adjoining the Seine, and there to relieve themselves by toasting and singing and flinging the empty flasks into{335} the river. These have been found, with the legend “Vive le Roi!” inscribed on them, after the fashion of the Moyenage potters. The Germans had a similar manner of keeping the toast from future impurity by throwing away the vessels in which it was drunk. Probably in this way the “Vrouw Jacoba’s Kannetjes” found their way into the Rhine and the moat of Teylingen. It is easy to imagine the potters toasting their lovely co-worker and superintendent, and, in the excess of their admiration and loyalty, tossing away the flagons, that they might never be drained to a less worthy toast. The story is attractive enough, and it is almost a pity that the pots which have been found are not of a high artistic rank. None of them is ornamented.
Fig. 289.—Fine German Stone-ware.
Fig. 290.—Fine German Stone-ware.
To the “common stone-ware” belong the pots called Graybeards (Fig. 287), from the bearded heads moulded on the necks. Many of these, though well formed, are rudely ornamented, and are of a very coarse composition (Fig. 288). The finer ware, which was made after the beginning of the sixteenth century, is divisible into two classes, the older belonging exclusively to the sixteenth century, and of a gray{336} white or pale yellow, the other of a bluish and gray tint, made down to the present time. This is the ware commonly called Grès de Flandre, although, so far as we know, Flanders never produced any, and the ware so designated is a purely German fabrication. The canettes, or tall cups, of a nearly cylindrical shape, sloping slightly inward toward the top, and belonging to the first class of yellowish white stone-ware, are of very elegant form, and are beautifully ornamented with reliefs, made from moulds of wood and admirably executed. The subjects are sometimes scriptural, sometimes heraldic.
To the second class of blue and gray stone-ware with salt glaze belong some of the best specimens of the art (Figs. 289 and 290). They date from 1500 to 1620, after which came the decline. The Bavarian town of Creussen made a peculiar stone-ware ornamented with colored reliefs. Of this we have samples in the “Apostle” mugs, so called from the reliefs surrounding them, and in a series of jugs with hunting scenes. These belong to the seventeenth century.
The Böttcher stone-ware will be noticed under porcelain, to the invention of which in Germany it was the first step.
PORCELAIN.
Böttcher.—His First Productions.—Meissen Porcelain.—Decoration.—Best Days of Meissen.—Its Decline.—Vienna.—Höchst.—Fürstenburg.—Höxter.—Frankenthal.—Nymphenburg.—Berlin.—Holland.—Weesp.—Loosdrecht.—The Hague.—Switzerland.—Zürich.—Nyon.
It will always be the distinguishing honor of Germany that the Saxon Böttger, or Böttcher, was the discoverer, for Europe, of a true kaolinic natural porcelain. The circumstances have already been detailed (see p. 52). While Böttcher was prosecuting his experiments in 1708, he had the furnace filled with trial pieces, which were fired for several days before a piece was withdrawn. A teapot was at length taken out and thrown into cold water. It was not porcelain, however, but a red stone-ware, very hard, and with a metallic ring when struck. It was called “red porcelain,” probably to suit the wishes of the experimenter and of his royal patron. A teapot of this ware has been sold in England for sixteen pounds sterling. A very good example of it is now in the possession of Mr. Davis Collamore,{337} of New York (Fig. 291), who was fortunate enough to pick it up in one of his European tours in quest of rare “bits.” It is undecorated, and shows admirably the rusty red color of Böttcher’s experimental stone-ware. Others of his early essays are almost black in color and are painted in relief. Several pieces are in the Metropolitan Museum.
Whenever the kaolin of Aue was discovered, Böttcher, on his first attempt, succeeded in making natural porcelain. Though Meissen, where a workshop was erected without delay after the discovery, was kept like a prison or fortress, and every precaution observed to insure secrecy, although every man connected with the works was under oath to keep silence in regard to anything he might see or discover, the precautions were all in vain. The knowledge oozed out, and in a very few years Meissen had several rivals. White ware was made down to 1718. The Nankin blue was the first colored ware imitated, and after 1718 other colors were introduced. Böttcher died in 1719, and was succeeded in the directorate by Horoldt (Fig. 293), who carried out several great improvements, and mingled the previous exclusively Oriental designs with some of a more purely European character. Heavy gilt borders surrounded figures, flowers, or the royal arms. In 1731, while the king himself was director, Kandler,{338} a sculptor, introduced, as an ornamentation for vases, flower wreaths in relief, and afterward attempted figures with great success. From 1725 to 1745 Lindenir, or Linderer, was painting the beautiful insects and birds which were his specialty. Then came, also during Kandler’s time, the exquisite paintings by European artists which brought the Chinese style effectually to a close. The brightest days of Meissen’s history were those from 1731 to 1756, before Frederick the Great robbed it, for the enrichment of Berlin, of men, moulds, models, and clay. Peace came too late to restore Meissen to its pre-eminence, as it now had rivals both at home and abroad in France and England.
The successive directors after Horoldt were the king, Augustus II., from 1731 to 1733; Count Brühl from 1733; the count’s widow from 1763; the king, Augustus III., from 1778; Count Marcolini from 1796 to 1814; Bengrath Oppal from 1814 to 1833. The factory was, for the second time, plundered in 1759, and although it subsequently attained to a high position, it never reached its former prosperity. A marked change in style is noticeable during the last quarter of the eighteenth century. The forms and ornaments both assume more of a classical character. This style, borrowed most likely from France, was adopted by Marcolini, and entirely superseded its predecessors. The manufacture was now in its decline. Meissen had lost its prestige, and gradually sank in importance. From about fifty years ago the decoration became coarse and the works no longer paid expenses, and at the present time Dresden ware is a decidedly inferior fabrication. According to Jacquemart, the manufactory is busy counterfeiting its own old productions and its old marks. In comparing Dresden with its former self, its present position relative to other factories must not be lost sight of. It still gives{339} to commerce many works which are valuable either for their historical associations or for their intrinsic merit. The candelabrum here given (Fig. 297) represents a style of work once very much in vogue at Dresden. It was Kandler who, while superintending the modelling department under Augustus II., between 1731 and 1733, introduced the beautifully fashioned flowers in relief, of which some idea may be formed from our specimen. Another, and a very curious work, is still reproduced, and specimens can occasionally be picked up in this country. Reference is made to the figures “Count Brühl’s Tailor” and “his Wife.” The originals of these pieces were made by Kandler in 1760, under the count’s directorate. With all his profligacy, Count Brühl was a good deal of a wit, and having been repeatedly requested by his tailor to accord him permission to look through the manufactory, at length consented. The tailor presented himself at the works in due time, and was there, to give him an appetite for farther exploration, presented with the two figures referred to. In one he saw himself astride of a he-goat, brandishing his professional shears and carrying the other appurtenances of his business on his back, while the goat carries his “goose” in its mouth. The other figure was that of his wife, with a baby in her arms, sitting upon a she-goat. The discomfited tailor saw no more of the porcelain manufactory. The many elegant forms and styles of Dresden are too numerous to be detailed. They embrace vases, candlesticks,{340} snuff-boxes, butterflies, flowers, clock-cases, and animal figures. The miniature paintings on some of the smaller pieces are exquisitely finished and wonderfully tinted.
The annals of the last century contain many curious stories of runaway workmen selling their secrets, and of the steps taken to keep down opposition and to acquire a knowledge of the manufacture by any means that offered. A runaway from Meissen led to the establishment at Vienna of a factory in 1720. After twenty years it rose to considerable eminence, although in both paste and glaze it is inferior to Dresden. Its raised gold decorations have brought it in modern times a certain celebrity. It came to an end during the directorate of Alexander Lowe, who was appointed in 1856. Some excellent specimens are in the collections of Mr. Walters, of Baltimore, and Mr. Gibson, of Philadelphia. From Vienna the secret spread to Höchst, whither it was conveyed by a workman named Ringler. Ringler was in the habit of carrying with him written notes regarding the manufacture. His fellow-workmen at Höchst made him drunk, copied his notes, and offered the secret thus obtained for sale at other centres. One of these runaways founded the workshop of Fürstenburg. A few of the Fürstenburg workmen attempted to establish a manufactory at Neuhaus, but, on discovery, were sent out of Brunswick. Another Fürstenburger,{341} a flower painter, tried to start the industry at Höxter, whither he had fled, but failed, and was followed in the endeavor by one of the defrauders of poor Ringler. This man’s name was Becker, and he succeeded in Höxter, after fruitlessly hawking his secret through Belgium, Holland, and France. He was bought up by the offer of a pension, and his competition was thus brought to an end. When Ringler awoke to a full realization of the consequences of his folly at Höchst, he went to Frankenthal, Bavaria, where the factory founded by Hannong, of Strasburg, made porcelain in 1755. This existed down to 1800. In the mean time, however, Ringler had left, as we find him first at Neudeck-Nymphenburg, in Bavaria, and then, in 1758, founding a factory at Ludwigsburg, Würtemberg, which was worked until 1821. The porcelain made here was of excellent quality, and the figure pieces were admirably modelled. After this we hear no more of Ringler. In this way the industry spread over the whole of Central Europe—to Anspach, Baireuth, Baden, to Hesse-Cassel, Darmstadt, and Thuringia, each new workshop becoming the centre for a number of offshoots.