Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 8.djvu/291

 search of suitable clay. At Sakai, in the province of Izumi; at various places in the Gokinai (five central provinces); in Omi, where the much employed Shigaraki earth was afterwards found; and at Kuwana, in Ise, he repeated his experiments. The idea of trying Owari had not occurred to him. So far from having practised the keramic art there before his journey to China, it was only through information accidentally obtained in Ise that he determined to visit the province. Even then his first essay, made at Hantsuki-mura, in the Chita district of Owari, was a failure. Ultimately he came to Seto, and there at last found what he wanted. It is said, indeed, that he pronounced the Seto earth superior to the Chinese Sobokai. The former was certainly the harder, but in closeness of grain the advantage lay with the latter. It may be mentioned here that among tea-jars used in Japan from old times, not a few of Chinese manufacture are to be found. They can generally be recognised at once by the nature of their pâte, which not only is so fine that its grain is scarcely perceptible, but also has a glistening appearance that suggests comparison with moist mud.

The pottery made by Katō Shirozaemon—or Tōshiro, as he soon came to be called—was far superior to any Japanese ware that had preceded it. He produced dainty little tea-jars of close, fine pâte, excellently manipulated. The thick, clumsy character of former specimens disappeared entirely. His pieces were no longer stoved in an inverted position, so that their edges, instead of being bare and fringed with irregular patches of glaze, were smooth and fairly finished. His glazes were lustrous and free from discontinuities and irregularities. Their colours were