Page:Brinkley - China - Volume 1.djvu/56

 which and other evidences it may safely be inferred that there is here no question of translucid porcelain. Indeed, the statement may be made at once that all the choice céladons of the Sung, the Yuan, and even the Ming dynasties were stone-ware, showing considerable variation in respect to fineness of pâte and thinness of biscuit, but never becoming true translucid porcelain. Of course the conclusion is not to be drawn that to manufacture translucid porcelain was beyond the keramic competence of the time. On the contrary, an opaque pâte seems to have been deliberately preferred as a suitable basis for Ching-tsu (green-coloured) glaze. It is exceedingly probable that, like all early-period céladons, that Ju-yao had pâte which was white except at places directly exposed to the heat of the kiln; that, in short, its clay, when not protected by the glaze, assumed a red, or red-brown tinge in the oven. Paucity of authenticated specimens precludes absolute certainty about these points. Japanese connoisseurs maintain, however, that this so-called "iron base" is not necessarily found in the best examples of Ju-yao, though it does constitute a mark of authenticity in the case of early céladons generally. Reference will be made to the point hereafter. The glaze of the Ju-yao presented great merits. It was so soft and lustrous that connoisseurs compared it to congealed fat. Its colour varied from a green almost verging upon a blue to white barely tinged with green. Very frequently the surface was crackled; sometimes it was entirely without crackle, specimens of the latter character being most highly prized. In the Tao-lu it is stated that the crackle of the Ju-yao was of two varieties. In the first case the surface was covered with a network of close, cir-