There are, of course, other reasons why china is or is not valuable, but this is a very solid reason too often overlooked. To be able to differentiate the good from the bad, “that is the question.” To know that a specimen is good is one thing, to give the reason why is another. When the reader begins to do this he or she is already a connoisseur. In order to give a fairly proportionate idea of what Wedgwood ware is, we quote a list and description of six different kinds of ware in his own words:— “1. A _terra-cotta_; resembling porphyry, granite Egyptian, pebble, and other beautiful stones of the silicious or crystalline order. [Illustration: WEDGWOOD TERRA-COTTA VASES _In Museum at Etruria._ _By courtesy of Messrs. Josiah Wedgwood & Sons._] “2. _Basaltes_ or black ware; a black porcelain biscuit of nearly the same properties with the natural stone; striking fire with steel, receiving a high polish, serving as a touchstone for metals, resisting all the acids, and bearing without injury a strong fire; stronger, indeed, than the basaltes itself. “3. _White porcelain biscuit_, of a smooth, wax-like surface, of the same properties with the preceding, except in what depends upon colour. “4. _Jasper_; a white porcelain biscuit of exquisite beauty and delicacy, possessing the general properties of the basaltes, together with the singular one of receiving through its whole substance, from the admixture of metallic calces with the other materials, the same colours which those calces communicate to glass or enamels in fusion—a property which no other porcelain or earthenware body of ancient or modern composition has been found to possess. This renders it peculiarly fit for making cameos, portraits, and all subjects in bas-relief, as the ground may be of any particular colour, while the raised figures are of a pure white. “5. _Bamboo_, or cane-coloured biscuit porcelain, of the same nature as No. 3. “6. A _porcelain biscuit_, remarkable for great hardness, little inferior to that of agate. This property, together with its resistance to the strongest acids and corrosives, and its impenetrability by every known liquid, adapts it for mortars and many different kinds of chemical vessels. “These six distinct species, with the Queen’s Ware already mentioned, expanded by the industry and ingenuity of the different manufacturers into an infinity of forms for ornament and use, variously painted and embellished, constitute nearly the whole of the present fine English earthenwares and porcelain which are now become the source of a very extensive trade, and which, considered as an object of national art, industry, and commerce, may be ranked amongst the most important manufactures of the kingdom.”