Page:Brinkley - China - Volume 1.djvu/350

 CHINA

sionally showed accidental fissures. Dismissing this variety, therefore, as unworthy of further attention, it remains to notice three principal kinds of choice green; namely, apple green (P7n-kwo-ts'ing), pea- cock green (Kang-tsiao-ts'ing), and cucumber-rind green (Kwa-pi-li).

It has already been explained that the term Pim- kwo-ts ing (green of the water-shield) is applied by the Chinese to a ware of which the dominant colour is generally red. But the same term has come to be used of a green monochrome arbitrarily called “ apple green” by foreign collectors. This ware owes its beauty to purity and delicacy rather than to richness. It invariably has large crackle, of the “starred-ice”’ type, and without such crackle would lose much of its charm. ‘The inside of good specimens has thick, creamy white glaze, which also is craguelé. ‘‘ Apple green” has the merit of being a couleur de grand feu ; that is to say, the colour is incorporated with the glaze and developed at the full temperature of the porcelain kiln. No mention is made of this ware among the noted productions of the Mzmg potters. The fine specimens by which it is now known date from one of the three great periods of the present dynasty, Kang-hst, Young-ching and Chien-lung, but many passable pieces were manufactured during the first half of the nineteenth century.

The tint of the peacock green is well described by its name: it is the full, dark, glowing colour seen on the neck and back feathers of the peacock. This variety differs essentially from apple green in being a colour developed at the low temperature of the decorator’s furnace. It ranks, in fact, with turquoise blue — or king-fisher blue — for a dark kind of

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