Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 8.djvu/130

 About 1878 an attempt was made to popularise the ware by decorating it with colours in the well-known Kutani style. This effort was very short-lived. It was followed, shortly afterwards, by a more wholesome impulse, the result of which is that the porcelain of Hirado has recovered much of its ancient reputation. This subject is more fully discussed in a subsequent chapter on modern keramic developments.

By foreign collectors few Japanese wares are better known than the Arita egg-shell porcelain. Very erroneous ideas prevail with respect to its antiquity, an age as great as two centuries being attributed to some pieces. The date of its first production cannot be fixed with absolute accuracy, but there are very strong grounds for believing that it was not manufactured before the latter part of the eighteenth century. There are two varieties, the one decorated with blue sous couverte; the other with red, gold, and sometimes light blue above the glaze. The latter is essentially modern. It was made originally for export, and considerable quantities of it have been shipped from Nagasaki during the past twenty years. Figure subjects—warriors in armour or courtesans in elaborate drapery—constitute the general decoration, which is seldom executed with any conspicuous skill. A pretty conception was to protect wine-cups of this fragile ware by envelopes of wonderfully finely plaited basket-work (ajiro-gumi). The envelopes were manufactured at Nagasaki, whither the cups were sent for sale,—usually in nests of three, five, or seven.

The blue-and-white egg-shell porcelain of Hizen, though commonly attributed to the Arita factories, was produced almost entirely at Mikawachi. Doubtless some pieces were originally manufactured at the