Terra-Cotta And Luca Della Robbia Ware, Considered On The Principles Of Decorative Art.

be the milk-pans resting on them . Instead o ^ the common-place lattice-work over its many windoAvs , hang wreaths , like Luca ' s , there , but so contrived , with spaces between the leaves , as to freely let in plenty of fresh air in summer ; ancl let these drooping garlands be made up of all the

juilk-wort family of flowers , to which must be added the bugloss ( Anchusa tinctoria ) , and the graceful arnatto—those two flowering-plants which give the English dairy-maid the colouring' for her cheeses .

If not already warned upon the subject , I would put you on your guard not to sink , in those of your works that are meant to stand the outside weather , any hollows Avhich can hold Avater . If you do , the likelihood is that the first winter they are exposed they will be severely hurt by frost .

While becoming ice , water crystallises , ancl with such mighty action , that , no matter the smallness ofthe quantity , nothing can withstand its strength ; ancl as the ice after is larger in bulk than the water before freezing , the IIOIIOAV being too small —too narrow for it in its UOAV state—cracks ; ancl

Avhen the thaw sets in , the broken piece falls off , ancl thus many a valuable production is deformed . In Mediasval architecture , not a moulding but one holds water ; and in that one Avhich does , the shallow is of such lines that , in freezing ' , the Avater has room enough , while outspreading itself ,

to rise upwards . Hence comes it that , although hundreds of harsh sharp winters have gone over them , those splendid monuments of our forefathers' munificence and wary thought , exuberant though those buildings be in deep-cut mouldings , roving crockets fashioned like leaves and flowers , ancl bunchy finials , still remain in wonderful preservation .

Turn we now from suggestions to realities , and let us see what has been clone—what is now doing—with this material , in all its several branches . Without needing to go further than this Museum and its neighbourhood , we come upon various

interesting instances respecting' decorative unglazed burned clay . Some works in white , done by Mr . Blanchard , of Blackfriars-road , possessed by the Museum , as Avell as those sharp , well brought-out casts from the bronze flag-stands before St . Mark ' s , Venice , doing the same duty now in the

Horticultural Gardens—but more especially the ornamentation in red upon the western Aving for the residential houses attached to this establishment , tell ns loudl y how admirably an Englishman of the clay can execute anything asked of him after this fashion . But a masterpiece of English pottery in high art is

the life-size statue of the great James Watt that came from the hands of the same able manufacturer . Red clays in a variety of tones , from a deep to comparatively a light one , can be got , and so nicel y graduated as , when wrought together , to give a most powerful effect to an elaborate design . Had Mr . Blanchard availed himself of such an

artistic colouring help upon his otherwise fine work in the Avest wing , just now noticed , all of it would have been much more telling , and stronger renderings given to all the lines in its ornamentation , which is somewhat too small to have all its beauty seen and appreciated at its present height . The large statue of Galileo Galilei , from the workshops of Siguor Boni , of Milan , besides a section of an elaborate architectural elevation from the same

artist , in red clay , show us what Italy can produce . In this latter admirable piece , the ornamentation is sharp ancl distinct in all its outlines , and those beautiful ancl exquisitely modelled busts , in the round , come forth Avell . The whole is so managed as , though very ornate , its parts are not too small

and its surface not crowded , but everything is boldly , but not overmuch , thrown up , so as to be advantageously beheld from below and at a distance , having thus a light and shade of its ownproperties to be wished for everywhere , but more especially in a land like Englandwith its often

, overclouded sun , ancl beneath a sky that , months long , darkens London . Signer Boni ' s works remind us of Milan , and Milan , of its magnificent hospital , about which we have before spoken , so beautifully fraught with burned clay ornamentation . But if Milan

may justly boast of an erection as one of the finest of the kind at the period , London can show a building in progress which , when finished , with

all its decorative burned clay upon it , Avill not only stand , for grandeur , beauty , and vastness , before the Milan hospital , but anything else after that manner that has been done since . What the great Hospital at Milan is to Italy , Ave foretell the South Kensington Museum will be , not to

England only , but to Europe , one of the finest among the fine erections in that style ; and the man who built it , Captain Fowke , will take a high place upon the roll of England's distinguished architects ; ancl his name , along Avith that of Mr . Sykeswho made the drawings and models for

, the decorative parts in burned clay , as well as that of Mr . Blanchard , who executed them , will go down to admiring future ages . In the front of the late International Exhibition , toAvards the Horticultural Gardens , burned clay , as far as it is called upon for helpis very efficient ,

, and constitutes the most jaleasing' feature upon that building , which might have been much improved by a more extensive employment of its enrichments . All about the Horticultural Gardens

themselves burned clay architectural ornamentation is brought in , and more especially upon the inside of its noble conservatory , but by no means as much and as artistically as might have been . In such a Avide and favourable field , still open to the adaptation of our national pottery in all its several

branches as a decorative art , let us hope to behold ere long its employment tliere in garlands , friezes , busts ancl reliefs , and statues—all , like its thus far unrivalled fountain , in artistically wrought and