In dealing with the underglaze ware from its first application to utilitarian services to its subtle use in placques and vases with _grand-feu_ colours, and finally in figure subjects and groups, it will be seen, both in regard to mastery of technique and artistic evolution, the natural order of development is that given in Chapter II in examining the stages of overglaze painting and modelling. At that period the order proceeds on lines of its own, and the usual stages of progression were influenced by the fact that in the early days of the factory Luplau, the first modelling-master, brought his experience to bear on the work, and figure subjects of a high order were attempted almost from the beginning. Here, in the Renaissance period, by slower evolution and particularly sure processes, the modelling of figures has arrived at a state of undoubted excellence. Apart from the first early inspiration when things Japanese broke upon Europe with overwhelming force, the Copenhagen artists have obtained their inspiration from within. They have followed the instincts of their own race, and they have developed on lines essentially their own, both in form, in colour, and in technique. The Europe of sixty years ago was sated with meaningless formalities. Tired with the repetition of the scanty stock of Greek ornaments, and in search of novelty, it is only natural that men should turn their eyes to the only living schools of decorative art then in existence. In India, China, and Japan was found the freshness that design needed. When Müller was producing his masterpieces in clay, Wedgwood was transplanting Greek gods and goddesses into Staffordshire, and Chippendale was fashioning his fretwork angles to tables and chairs, taken direct from China. Between those days and the present is the great wave of classicism which dug out Etruscan vases and remodelled them, brought the Latin chair into the early nineteenth-century drawing-room, and with stilted affectation of simplicity drove elegance and comfort far afield. [Illustration: PEASANT FIGURES. Painted in underglaze colours. Modelled by Chr. Thomsen.] Of all Oriental schools it is thus natural that the Japanese, with the unexpected and unsymmetrical treatment of design, should appeal most at such a time. The true and fine feeling of the Japanese for birds and beasts, for the flower world and for landscape in its larger features, is shown in all their design, from the small ivory carvings to the lacquer work or the colour prints of Katsuchika Hokusai. The West has learned much from the East in the nineteenth century. Whistler's Nocturnes and Aubrey Beardsley's pen drawings catch their germ of novelty from sources other than European.