Page:Brinkley - China - Volume 1.djvu/439

off in flakes. Direct experiments long ago showed that enamels cannot be used in the decoration of European porcelains owing to this grave defect. Whatever be the cause to which, in the case of European porcelain, this want of adherence on the part of the enamels is due, I think that it is to be found in the difference between the natures of the glazes of the two wares. The more fusible pâte of Chinese porcelain had to be covered with a glaze more fusible than that used in Europe, and it is the introduction of lime into the glazing material which, by diminishing the infusibility of the latter, and, perhaps, modifying its expansion, approaches its physical properties to those of enamel. If the aspect of Chinese porcelains differs from that of ours, if the harmony of their painting seems more varied, these things are, I believe, the necessary result of the methods employed in China. All the colours employed there have but little colouring matter; they have no value unless they are given a thickness which imparts to them a degree of relief impossible to obtain otherwise. The harmony of their decoration results from the nature and composition of their enamels.

"It remains only to say a few words of the processes of stoving the tender colours, or couleurs de demi-grand feu. Chinese books, and plates that we have seen separate the furnaces into two divisions—open and closed. The former are similar to the furnaces employed by enamellers. I am not aware that they are used anywhere in Europe for stoving decorated porcelain except in Germany. Even in China, the danger of breakage limits the employment of such furnaces to the stoving of small pieces. Large speci-