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CHAPTER   IX
THE PORCELAIN OF CHINA—(continued)

King-te-chen and the Père D’Entrecolles

THERE is nothing more remarkable in the history of the porcelain of China, than the fact of the concentration in one spot, for so many centuries, of an industry for the supply of almost the entire population. So that as regards porcelain, as China stands to the rest of the world, so the town of King-te-chen stands to the rest of China. In fact, to parody a French saying,—‘Qui dit porcelaine dit la Chine, qui dit la Chine dit King-te-chen.’

Let us then consider the position of this town, above all in relation to the three principal outlets of its trade—I mean the supply of the court at Pekin, the export at Canton, and the general demand of the country. If the reader will consult a good map of China, one that shows the rivers, for these are the real trunk-lines of the commerce of the country, he will soon understand in what a commanding position King-te-chen is placed. It is true that the distance from Pekin is not far short of a thousand miles, following the winding course of the Grand Canal, the Yang-tse river, and the waters of the Po-yang lake; but by this route there is water communication without a break for the whole way.⁷⁶ So again the whole journey to Canton may be made by boat, with the exception of a short portage over the watershed on the borders of the provinces of Kiang-si and Kuang-tung. This was the route taken by Lord Amherst in 1816-17, when returning overland from Pekin to Canton. The journey is well described by Sir John Davis in his Sketches of China. As they approached the Po-yang lake, the porcelain shops and depôts in the towns became more and more prominent. These were supplied from the emporium at Jao-chau Fu, the great city near the spot where the river descending from King-te-chen falls into the Po-yang lake. Davis describes the beautiful scenery and the classical associations of the mountainous country surrounding the lake. Proceeding southward they ascended the Kia-kiang river, passing by Nan-chang Fu, a great centre for the commerce of southern China. The river is very shallow in its upper course, but along it passes a constant stream of traffic, by means of a narrow passage scooped out in the shingly bed. The Meiling Pass is crossed by a paved road, partly excavated in the rock and in places cut into steps—a road made some twelve centuries ago by an emperor of the Tang dynasty. After a journey of some thirty miles on horseback another stream was reached, down which they floated to the great Western River and the waters of Canton. It is by this route that nine-tenths of the Chinese porcelain that has reached Europe must have passed. How this porcelain is packed at King-te-chen and forwarded to Canton and to other parts of China is well shown in a series of native drawings exhibited by the side of the cases containing the porcelain in the British Museum.

King-te-chen stands on a small river that flows south-west to fall into the Po-yang lake. At this point, close by the lake, lies, as already mentioned, the city of Jao-chau, the capital of the whole district and the residence of the prefect. King-te-chen, however, the town of the potter, is not directly subordinate to Jao-chau; to the official mind it is a mere dependency of the sub-prefecture of Fouliang, a small walled town or hsien in the immediate neighbourhood. It is in the annals of this hsien that the early history of King-te-chen is to be found. We may compare the relative positions of these three Chinese towns with those existing in the eighteenth century between the long straggling villages of Burslem or Stoke and the adjacent town of Newcastle in the first place, and then between the latter and the county town of Stafford. The importance of King-te-chen may, however, be inferred from the fact that the superintendent of the imperial potteries was often at the same time controller of the local customs and viceroy of the surrounding provinces.

King-te-chen, then, was built where the little river flowed out from the barren mountain tract to the east—a region made still more barren by the cutting down of all the wood to provide fuel for the kilns, and whose inhabitants were reputed to be as rude and rugged as their surroundings. It is from the gorges of this rough hilly country that the precious kaolin and petuntse are excavated. These substances are formed locally by the decomposition of the rock of which the hills are composed, a variety of graphic granite with much soda-holding felspar.

In a narrow space, crowded for more than four miles along the river bank between shops, temples, and guardhouses, were built the kilns and the workshops. Towards the south rises a small hill where the tiled roofs of the temples and pavilions are seen half hidden among the trees. This is the Jewel or Guardian Hill which commands the adjacent imperial manufactory. This factory was first established here in the fourteenth century, but since then it has been more than once burned to the ground in times of riot and rebellion. The works were last rebuilt in 1866.

Dr. Bushell has translated an official description of the series of workshops, from the mixing-house to the muffle-furnaces of the enamellers, the whole enclosed by a wall about a mile in circuit. The kilns are no longer within the enclosure as they were in Ming times. The imperial porcelain is now fired in private furnaces scattered through the town.

The French Jesuit missionary to whom, above any one else, is due the credit of first describing to the people of the West the nature of porcelain and how it was made, was living, at the time when the earliest of his famous letters was written (in 1712), at Jao-chau, the capital of the district. The letter is addressed to the procureur of the order in Paris, and it would seem that it was before long made public.⁷⁷ It was followed in 1722 by a second supplementary letter, dated this time from King-te-chen itself. The Père D’Entrecolles had already been many years in China, and had before this sent home important letters on other branches of Chinese industry. The first letter on porcelain gives proof of long acquaintance with the subject, and it is not impossible that he may already have corresponded with some one in Europe on the same subject. I make this suggestion in connection with the curious coincidence of date between the residence of D’Entrecolles in this district and the first manufacture of porcelain in Saxony.

These letters were naturally read with avidity at this time in Paris and elsewhere. The seed fell on fertile ground, and but one thing was wanting, and that was—some actual specimens of the materials described by the Jesuit father. The indications on this head, given in the letters, were indeed quite insufficient, and would rather tend to put inquirers on a false scent. The writer, for example, had no notion of the real nature of kaolin, a substance which in one place he compares to chalk. On the other hand, the technical details so fully given were at that time new. Since then this information has filtered down through many books, so that much of it now appears quite trite.

I will confine myself to a few extracts bearing on points of interest that I may have overlooked elsewhere. These letters are written in the clear, flowing language of the time, and they are delightful reading. After giving some account from the Annals of Fouliang of the early history of porcelain, and describing how the industry was gradually concentrated at King-te-chen, the Père D’Entrecolles goes on to say: ‘Apart from the pottery that is made all over China, there are a few other provinces, as those of Fukien and Canton, where porcelain is made.’ By Canton, in this case, we must understand, I suppose, the province of Kuang-tung, and this is a piece of information of some interest. The attempts made to establish workmen from King-te-chen at Pekin, and again in the neighbourhood of Amoy, from which port so large a commerce was already carried on with Europe, had, he says, wholly failed.

There then follows a description of King-te-chen, with its long streets and its population of more than a million, ‘as is commonly reported.’ He tells us of a rich Chinese merchant who, after making his fortune in the Indies, had built a magnificent temple to the Queen of Heaven (Kwan-yin, probably). The European piastres he had brought back were well known in the district, although this was not the case in other parts of China. We have a picture of the busy quay and of the three ranges of junks closely packed along the side, and for a background the whirlwinds of flame rising from the three thousand kilns of the city.⁷⁸ After praising the admirable police arrangements, he comes to his main subject, the manufacture of porcelain.

The small vessels that bring down the kaolin and the petuntse (in the latter he notes the scattered shiny particles—the mica) from a distance of twenty or thirty leagues are even more numerous than the big junks that take the finished ware down to Jao-chau. The details of manufacture that follow—and to quote them would be only to go once more over the ground covered in a previous chapter—were learned by the Père D’Entrecolles not only from the Christian workmen, but by frequent visits to the works themselves. ‘These great laboratories,’ he tells us, ‘have been for me a kind of Areopagus where I have preached’ (I quote the rest in French) ‘celui qui a formé le premier homme de limon et des mains duquel nous sortons pour devenir des vases de gloire ou d’ignominie.’

In describing the preparation of the paste much stress is laid upon the care taken to exclude all extraneous matter, especially that which may have been introduced into the kaolin or petuntse by way of adulteration. The slip for the glaze—for the latter the Chinese term ‘oil’ is retained—is said to be brought down from the mountains, where it is prepared, in a liquid form. The division of labour in the manufacture is carried so far that a piece of porcelain before completion may pass through the hands of as many as seventy workmen, to each of whom a separate task is assigned.

The important part played by moulding, both as a direct process and subsidiary to throwing on the wheel, is well brought out in this description. I will give a rendering of the passage in which the process of moulding is described, as in an English translation in a recent work there is some apparent confusion. ‘When the piece to be copied is of such a nature that it cannot be imitated with the potter’s hands on the wheel, a special kind of clay used only for moulds is impressed upon it [i.e. upon the model]. In this way a mould is made of several pieces, each of a considerable size. These pieces are now dried, and when they are required for use they are held near the fire for some time, after which they are filled with the paste to the thickness desirable in the porcelain. The paste is pressed in with the hands and the mould is again placed near the fire. The impressed figure becomes at once detached from the mould by the heat that consumes the moisture that has made it adhere. The different parts of a piece separately moulded are now joined together with a somewhat liquid slip, made of the same material as the porcelain.’ Great numbers of these moulds are kept in stock, so that an order from Europe can be quickly executed.

The porcelain painters, he tells us, are just as ‘poor beggars’ (gueux) as the other workmen; and he has evidently a very mean opinion of the art of painting as practised at that time in China: ‘Ils ignorent les belles règles de cet Art.’ But such an estimate of Oriental art was universal at that time, when everything was measured from the standpoint of Versailles and the roi soleil. ‘The work of the painter is divided in the same laboratory among a great number of workmen. It is the sole business of one to trace the coloured circle that we see near the edge of the vessel; another draws the outline of the flowers, which a third fills in. One painter does the mountains and the water, another the birds and the animals. It is the human figure that is the most badly handled.... As for the colours on the porcelain, we find all sorts. Little is seen in Europe except that with bright blue on a white ground. I think, however, that our merchants have brought over other kinds.’ (The implication is, no doubt, ‘since I have left France.’ This helps us to fix the date of the introduction of coloured porcelain into Europe.) ‘Some we find with a ground like that of our burning mirrors.’ (This is doubtless the Wu-chin, or metallic black of the Chinese. This ‘mirror-black’ is compared to a concave glass blackened behind.) ‘Other kinds are wholly red, and among them some are d’un rouge à l’huile (yu-li-hung), and some of a rouge soufflé (chui-hung), and covered with little points almost like a miniature. When these two varieties are executed with perfect success—and to do this is difficult enough—they are highly esteemed and are very dear.’ The yu-li-hung, literally ‘red inside the glaze,’ may be taken to include the various shades of red derived from copper, of the grand feu. The rouge soufflé is explained below. The word ‘miniature’ is used, I think, in the old sense of an illuminated manuscript. ‘Finally there are kinds of porcelain with the landscapes on them painted with a mixture of nearly every colour, heightened by a brilliant gilding. These are very beautiful, if no expense is spared. Otherwise the ordinary porcelain of this kind is not to be compared with that which is painted with azure alone. The Annals of King-te-chen say that formerly the people used nothing but a white ware.’

The source of the cobalt blue is now discussed and its mode of preparation. The raw material is thrown into the bed of the furnace and there roasted for twenty-four hours. It is then reduced to an impalpable powder in a mortar of biscuit porcelain. The red is made by roasting copperas to a high temperature in a crucible. The white that is used as an enamel in decorating porcelain is prepared from ‘un caillou transparent,’ which is also roasted on the floor of the furnace.⁷⁹ This caillou is mixed with two parts of white lead, and this mixture forms a flux—the basis for the colours. There then follows some account of the other colours used, but here it is difficult to follow the good father. He makes some strange statements, which are not all of them cleared up in his supplementary letter of 1722. There are indeed so many amplifications and corrections in the latter that it will be well to combine in our summary the gleanings from the two sources. This second letter is dated from King-te-chen after an interval of ten years, and shows a greater acquaintance with practical details.

Passing over the account of the flambé and of some other glazes—to avoid repetition we will defer our remarks till we come to speak of these wares in the next chapter—we hear in the second letter of a valuable material lately discovered which may take the place of kaolin in the composition of the paste. This is described as a chalky-looking body which is largely used by Chinese doctors as a medicine and is called Hua-shi.

We will here interrupt the Père D’Entrecolles’s account to mention that the hua-shi is strictly speaking soapstone or steatite, a silicate of magnesia. But whether magnesia ever enters into the paste or glaze of Chinese porcelain is as yet a disputed question.⁸⁰ As far as I know, it has never been found by analysis. The Chinese nomenclature of rocks is necessarily based on their physical aspect alone. Some specimens sent from King-te-chen, which were described on the labels as hua-shi, were found at Sèvres to consist of an impure kaolin containing a large quantity of mica.

To return to the father’s letters:—In China this hua-shi is five times as dear as kaolin. Four parts of it are mixed with one part of petuntse to make the paste. The porcelain made with this material is rare, and much more expensive than any other. Compared to ordinary porcelain, it is as vellum compared with paper; it is, besides, of a lightness that is quite surprising. It is, however, very fragile, and there are great difficulties connected with the firing. For this reason it is sometimes only applied as a coating to the surface of ordinary paste. The hua-shi is also used to form an ivory-white slip, with which designs are delicately painted on the surface of the vessel. (We may probably identify this hua-shi ware with the sha t’ai or ‘soft paste,’ so called, of Western collectors.)

What we are told by the Jesuit father about the revival of the manufacture of celadon is of great interest. ‘I was shown this year,’ he says, ‘for the first time, a new kind of porcelain which is now in fashion. It is of a colour approaching olive, and is called Lung-chuan.’ The colour of the glaze is given by the same yellow earth that is used for the or bruni glaze, and it is often highly crackled. With this statement we may compare the account which he gives in another part of his second letter of the revival of the manufacture of archaic wares. ‘The Mandarin of King-te-chen, who honoured me with his friendship, made presents to his protectors at the court of pieces of old porcelain [sic] which he has the talent to make himself. I mean that he has found the art of imitating the ancient ware, or at least that of a considerable age, and he employs a number of workmen with this object. The material of these false antiques (Chinese Ku-tung) is a yellowish earth brought from the Ma-an mountains. They are very thick—a plate which the Mandarin gave me was ten times the usual weight. The peculiarity of this ware is the glaze made from a yellowish rock, which becomes sea-green on firing.’ This change of colour, of course, was the result of a reducing flame, but note the keen observation of the narrator. ‘When completed the pieces are boiled in a very greasy soup, and then left for a month or more in the most foul drain that can be found. After this process they may claim to be three or four hundred years old, and to date from the dynasty preceding the Ming. They resemble the real antiques in not giving a ringing note when struck.... They have brought me from the débris of a large shop a little plate which I value more than the finest porcelain made a thousand years ago. On it is painted a crucifix between the Holy Virgin and St. John. Such pieces were made formerly for Japan, but they have not been in demand for the last sixteen or seventeen years.’ These plates, he thinks, were smuggled into that country mixed with other goods, for the use of the native Christians. (Cf. the Japanese dish, Pl. xiv.)

PLATE XIV. JAPANESE, IMARI WARE, BLUE AND WHITE WITH GOLD

The account given by the Père D’Entrecolles of the firing of porcelain is so detailed and accurate that it forms an interesting commentary on what we have said in a former chapter on this subject.⁸¹ We have first a description of the man who carries the unbaked ware to the furnace, ranged on two long narrow planks. Balancing these on his shoulders, he threads his way through the narrow streets, for the furnaces, as we have seen, may often be a long way from the factory. He goes on to say, ‘the place where the furnaces are presents another scene. In a kind of vestibule in front of the kilns are seen heaps of clay boxes destined to contain the porcelain.’ These, of course, are the ‘seggars’ already described. Each piece of porcelain of any size has its own case. The smaller pieces are packed many together in one seggar. On the bottom of each of these cases is a layer of sand covered with a little powdered kaolin. Each seggar forms the cover to the one below it, and so the whole furnace is filled with these great piles of cases each packed with porcelain. ‘By favour of this thick veil the beauty, and if I may so express myself, the complexion of the porcelain is not tanned by the ardour of the fire.’ The workman, without touching the fragile raw pieces, rapidly transfers them to the furnace by means of a flexible wooden fork. There are six inches of coarse gravel in the bottom of the furnace, and on this rest the piles of seggars. The middle range is at least seven feet high, the two lowest seggars in each pile being left empty, as is also the one on the top. The middle of the furnace is reserved for the finest porcelain, while near the front are the pieces made with a more fusible paste. The piles of seggars are strengthened by being battened together with clay, but it is the first duty of the fireman to see that there is a free passage of air. The seggars are made in a large village a league from King-te-chen, with a mixture of three kinds of clay.

The furnaces, he tells us, which are now of larger dimensions than formerly, are built over a capacious arched vault, and the hearth or fireplace extends across the whole width of the front of the furnace. It would seem that the process of firing is carried on more rapidly than in former days, and to economise fuel and time the smaller pieces at any rate are taken out a few hours after the extinction of the fire. Sometimes on opening the furnace the whole contents, both seggars and porcelain, are found to be reduced to a half-melted mass as hard as a rock. A change in the weather may alter in a moment the action of the fire, so that a hundred workmen are ruined to one who succeeds and is able to set up a crockery shop.

The ware made in European style finds no favour with the Chinese, and if not accepted by the export merchants remains on the maker’s hands.

We are told of the marvellous tours de force executed in porcelain, some years ago, for the heir-apparent, especially of certain open-work lanterns⁸² and strange musical instruments. We see from this at how early a date the future emperor (Yung-cheng) showed an interest in porcelain. The Chinese, it is said, succeed above all in grotesques and in figures of animals; the workmen make ducks and tortoises that float on the water. They make, too, many statues of Kwan-yin,—she is represented holding a child in her arms, and in this form is invoked by sterile women who wish for children.

The mandarins, he continues, who appreciate the talents of Europeans for ingenious novelties, have sometimes asked me to procure for them from Europe new and curious designs, so that they may have something singular to present to the emperor.⁸³ On the other hand, the Christian workmen strongly urged me to do no such thing. For the mandarins do not yield so easily as our merchants when told that a proposed work is impracticable. Many are the bastinados given to the men before the official will abandon the design from which he hoped so much profit.

‘What becomes of the vast accumulation of potsherds, both from the seggars and from the firings?’ the writer finally asks. Mixed with lime, they are largely used to form a cement with which the walls of gardens and roads are constructed. They also help to build up the new ground which is reclaimed from the banks of the river. Carried down thence by the floods, they form a glittering pavement for many miles below the town.

In the detailed account of King-te-chen given by the Jesuit father, we find no mention of the imperial manufactory. Are we to understand that he found no admittance to these workshops? His acquaintance with the higher mandarins makes this unlikely. Nor can we think that these works were closed during the long period of his stay in this district. Another omission that has been pointed out is, I think, more easy of explanation. The Père D’Entrecolles, while giving in great detail the method of preparation of the various colours used in the enamels and glazes, does not say a word about the famous crimson derived from gold, so largely used in the famille rose decoration. I cannot but think that this omission is an almost conclusive proof that the rouge d’or was not known at that time.⁸⁴ The ignorance of the Chinese of chemical processes is dwelt upon, and it is especially mentioned that they are acquainted with neither aqua fortis nor aqua regia.