Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 8.djvu/124

 Ching-tê-chên were freely imported into Japan, and sold to the factories at the rate of fifty shillings a pound (avoirdupois). The Hirado potter, instead of using this mineral—gosu he called it—without further preparation, subjected it to various processes of refinement, until at last not more than one-sixth of its original bulk remained available. That he could have produced a colour fully equal in depth and brilliancy to that of the Chinese keramist, there is no reasonable doubt. But he preferred a delicate tint, and counted its production a genuine tour de force. Of the execution of the designs it is impossible to speak too highly. One is puzzled to conceive, in the first place, how etching so wonderfully fine and outlines of such detailed accuracy can have been transferred to a surface of baked clay, and, in the second, how every process of glazing and stoving can have been effected with sufficient skill to preserve these delicate pictures. There are few subjects which the artists of Mikawachi did not depict upon their pieces, and fewer still in which they fell short of marked success. It will be understood that, for the general reasons already detailed, they seldom introduced human figures into their designs. Yet even here an exception must be made in favour of children, Rishi, Bōdhisattva, and so forth. Little boys at play—a design known in Japan as Kara-ko-asobi)— [sic] are constantly found upon cups, wine-bottles, water-holders, and plates of Hirado-yaki. These figures are generally associated in good specimens with a variety of cord-and-tassel pattern, known as yo-raku-de. The number of the children was seven, five, or three, indicating, respectively, first, second, and third class ware. In the decoration of larger pieces the artist went farther