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

duction of dressing-table candlesticks , wreathed with garlands , and plates with fruits and floAvers in raised work , for the ornament of a lady ' s boudoir ; probably the very first of the latter which Avas made by him , he sent over to me to look at , and the then Countess of Shrewsbury bought it ;

¦ and at the sale , in 1857 , at Alton Towers , it was sold under the catalogue number 1 , 228 . During one of those delightful chats I had with

Minton , I urged upon him , specifying the various purposes to which they might be decoratively app lied , the imitating of those coloured , glazed , Medieval tiles once so generally used in flooring the chancels of our old' English churches . " But where can one find them ? " asked my friend . " In

many places , " I ansAvered ; " for instance , in Great Malvern Priory Church ; many such are described and figured in the ' Archjsologia' and other antiquarian books . " " Though , perhaps , quite well enough for your studies , that Avill hardly do for my purpose" said Minton ; "I want not merelto

, y see but to handle—to turn over , to look at , on both sides , to closely examine specimens of unknoAvn pottery- and china ; to find out , as much as may be , the Avay in which they were wrought ancl ornamented . So , too , do my workmen . But I

Avill bear your suggestion m mind , and we Avill talk of it another time . " We did ; and he told me " it would not pay . " A feAv years afterwards he tried , ancl the venture not only " paid , " but paid splendidly ; and so great was its success , that such a- reviA al of olden pottery not only has got into

very wide use , but iu many places and with many people , the produce itself now goes by no other name than that of Minton tiles . The fact is that Minton , on more occasions than one , lamented to me the sad want in England of a history , in specimensof the ceramic art in all its many branches

, —of all ages and nations—for the improvement -of our OAATI people , in its manufacture ; and , at one period , his thought Avas to try and mend the want himself by beginning to bring together samples in a museum at Stoke-upon-Trent .

But , at the time , this deficiency of England Avas the deficiency of every other country in the Avorld . Let us begin with a land where the potter ' s craft had been ahvays held in high repute—with the great Italian art-centres . Of old , as Avell as ancient Sicily , Magna Grascia Avas famous for its

beautiful A ases of burned clay , ' elegantly shaped , and most artistically figured with passages from Homer and the Greek dramatic Avriters , in black upon a red ground , or in red upon black ; in some instances , too , in various colours , but always overlaid with a fine , thin , delicate glazing ; and that

instructive case , on loan from Mr . Witt , shoAvs us ivhat was the care AA'hich the potters of those days took to bestoAV graceful shapes and becoming ornam entation not merely upon . great , but little things—upon the common hardware vessels of every-day household use . What the ancient Parthenope was to Magna Gratia , Naples still is to

those same portions of South Italy that composed it , its queen , its capital . Itself , too , not long ago , was celebrated for its Capo di Monte ware , as it still is for its imitation of the ancient fictile painted vases ; and that curious figured and coloured sort of pottery that goes with some by the namefor

, want of a better , of Abruzzi Avare , and just now creeping into English notice , some fine specimens of which are in Lady Holland ' s possession , was , and may-be still is , the production of its provinces . "Yet , putting aside its magnificent collection of old fictile vases , Naples neither has nor ever had a

specimen-history of ceramic art . Coming northward , Ave get to Rome ; and , casting a hasty glance at the Capitoline galleries , which in any other city would be looked upon as a first-class magnificent museum , Ave hurry to the Vatican—the glorious Vaticanthat hill of marvelsthe art-Avorld ' s sun

, , , which has neA ^ er been as yet eclipsed . Yet there , though we behold so many Avonders wrought by the ancient Heathen ' s chisel , so many masterpieces of the Christian jjeneil , we find , Avith the exception cf a feAv fictile vases in the library , nothing' that illustrates what has been clone in burned

clay , coloured or uncoloured . Yet in the Roman States was one of its most useful and beautiful branches invented and carried to such high perfection , that a city ofthe Papal patrimony , Faenza , gave , as far as France was concerned , name not merely to onebut all kinds of household

earthen-, ware , called to this day by the French "faience ;" and scholars of Raffaelle ' s are said to have furnished the drawings for the subjects figured on . many of those pieces of earthenware done at Urbino , an ancient fief of the Holy See . But at Florence , once so renowned for its master-hands in all burned

clay works , hoAv fares it there ? Though the vast halls of its magnificent public gallery are filled with so much that is beautiful of ancient and more modern art , it has no collection of earthenware . Rich as is that fine city in that kind knoAvn by

the name of Della Robbia ware , its numerous valuable specimens are scattered about among its several churches , not always placed in the best positions for study , and rendering the comparison of one piece with another very hard and unsatisfactory , if not quite impossible . In all and each

one of the art-collections throughout the great cities in upper Italy we speed no better . Going to Germany , even at Vienna , in that A ery interesting and most ancient of all art-museums the delightful Ambras , we find nothing to our purpose . The same disappointment meets us at Munich , at

Berlin , ay , too , at that city of china by pre-eminence , Dresden , Avith its green vaults and its japan palace . So also in Belgium and Holland . Getting nearer home , and halting at Paris , not even at that most charming place the Hotel Cluny—not even at the splendid Tuileries ( and as we all knoAV the Avord tuileries means simply a place where one kind of earthenware is made—a tilery ); in fact ,