Page:Brinkley - China - Volume 1.djvu/166

 antiquity. But there are no "Hawthorns," in the Western sense of the term, dating from the Ming dynasty. Previously to the Kang-hsi era the method had been merely accessory: it was used in parts only of the general design. From about the middle of the seventeenth century Chinese potters began to act upon the inspiration of entirely covering the surface of the biscuit (beneath the glaze) with rich, brilliant blue, among which flowering branches of plum, or, in less elaborate specimens, petals only of the blossom, were reserved, showing white and soft upon a ground of deep, glowing colour. Unquestionably this fashion of decoration is one of the most beautiful ever invented in China or anywhere else. It has every quality that should be possessed by ornamental porcelain—grace, softness, solidity, brilliancy, richness, and delicacy. Yet that Chinese connoisseurs did not rank it particularly high is proved by the nature of the specimens upon which the decoration is chiefly found; as, for example, ginger-pots, sugar-jars, and vases of comparatively mediocre quality. Neither the experts nor the virtuosi of the Middle Kingdom appreciated the charms of a ware for pieces of which every Western collector of taste searches with wise avidity. The colour and tone of the blue in the best Hawthorns of the Kang-hsi period show that a mineral was used in no respect inferior to the best Mohammedan pigment. An interesting fact is that the first Japanese potter—Gorodayu Go-shonzui—who manufactured translucid porcelain, having visited China in  to study keramic processes, returned to Japan with a conviction that sprays and blossoms of the plum were eminently suitable for purposes of porcelain decoration. Among all the