Page:Brinkley - China - Volume 1.djvu/162

 But in the Wan-li period, when four thousand flower-vases of various shapes and sizes and five thousand jars with covers appear in the imperial requisition at one time, the manufacturers of hard-paste porcelain seem to have frequently turned out pieces of imposing proportions. Vases of huge dimensions had, indeed, been manufactured at an earlier date. The Tao-lu states that special kilns existed at Ching-tê-chên for baking monster bowls, vases, and jars, as much as six feet high and having biscuit five inches thick. Some of these were decorated with floral designs, but the majority had dragons among clouds or waves, a subject repeated ad nauseam upon Chinese porcelains of all periods. They were stoved one or two at a time, and their baking occupied nine days. During the first seven days a slow fire was kept up, with the object of gradually expelling the moisture contained in the porcelain mass. Then for two days and two nights the furnace was raised to such a temperature that the porcelain became perfectly red and afterwards white. After this the fire was extinguished, and the aperture of the kiln having been sealed, ten days were allowed for the cooling process. Of these monster pieces some survive in Chinese collections, but few have found their way Westward. At what era their manufacture was first undertaken the records do not say, but it appears to have been continued down to the end of the Wan-li period. Specimens of smaller but still imposing dimensions dating from the latter period are familiar to American and European collectors. They are, for the most part, fish-bowls and jars decorated with dragons; their pâte dense and of medium quality, their glaze lustrous but lacking purity, and the blue sous couverte of deep, purplish