As the pottery trade was taking root in the district, it is no wonder that we find many intelligent manufacturers doing their best to improve it and make it profitable. Eminent amongst them was Josiah Wedgwood, whose name as a potter is never likely to perish. For particulars concerning his private life, trade, and manufacture, there are two excellent books, by Miss Meteyard and Mr. Llewellyn Jewitt, in which every matter of interest about him has been carefully entered. Born at Burslem, in 1730, of a family of potters, he began by serving his apprenticeship as a thrower under his brother, and must have settled in business very early, as he had had already two partners when he set up on his own account, in 1759, being then only twenty-nine years of age. His first attempts seem to have been directed to making a green ware, that is, a white ware covered with a glaze of that colour, which he succeeded in getting particularly bright; and also to the tortoiseshell, which had its surface mottled with glazes differently stained, and which, by their blending when they are fused in the oven, present some analogy with the works of Palissy. One of Wedgwood's decided successes was, perfecting the white cream-colour ware, which was so superior to anything done before, that it commanded at once a great sale at home and abroad. Queen Charlotte admired it much, and, in consequence of her patronage, it took the name of Queen's ware, under which it was known for a long time. It is light, of a pleasing colour, elegantly shaped, and in the hands of artists has proved an admirable material to paint upon. It would take too long to enumerate all the improvements which Wedgwood effected in his trade in the second half of the last century, but I must mention as prominent amongst his works, the black Egyptian and jasper wares, in making which he had no assistance whatever, and which constitute two new and perfect types in pottery. From Wedgwood's origin and early labours, it is easy to guess that his instruction must have been limited; but he was a clear-minded and inquiring man, possessing that sort of intuition by which he could easily understand things, which in other people would have required preliminary studies; besides, he had a natural taste for art and a systematic way of going through his experiments, which were sure to bring them to a successful issue. It was his good fortune to be assisted by two men of superior intelligence, viz. Flaxman, the sculptor, who designed many of his shapes, and modelled for him an almost innumerable number of subjects for slabs and cameos; and Thomas Bentley, a distinguished scholar, with whom he was commercially connected, and whose knowledge of art he found of great utility.