The first mention of English teapots which I have chanced to see is in the private memorandum book of John Dwight, of Fulham, potter. The date of the entry is previous to 1695. It is a receipt for “the fine white clay for Dishes or Teapots to endure boiling water.” Under date of November, 1695, he says: “The little furnace where the last Red Teapots was burnt I take to be a convenient one for this vse.” An entry dated 1691 tells of a “strong Hardy Clay fit for Teapots;” and again of a “dark colour’d Cley for marbled Dishes and teapots to endure boiling water.” In Houghton’s Collections of 1695 we read: “Of teapots in 1694 there came but ten, and those from Holland, but to our credit be it spoken, we have about Fauxhall made a great many, and I cannot gainsay but they are as good as any came from abroad.” The first successful experiment of Bottcher in the manufacture of porcelain took the form of a teapot; and potters of succeeding years have spent much time and thought in inventing new shapes and decorations for tea-drawing vessels. Would it not be interesting to have a cabinet with a chronological and also a cubical succession of teapots, from the tiny ones of Elers-ware used in the time of Queen Anne, when tea was sold in ounce packages at the apothecaries, down to the great three-quart teapot used by Dr. Johnson and sold at the sale of Mrs. Piozzi’s effects? There would I stop and never admit as a teapot the ugly great spouted earthen casks made in Japan, to satisfy abnormal-minded and craving collectors. Into one of these hideous monstrosities in the possession of a well-known collector, two men were able to crawl, seat themselves, and have the cover placed over them—a sight to make the judicious china-lover grieve. In still another china-succession might we write the history of the teapot in America, from the simple plebeian undecorated earthenware pot in which was sparingly placed the precious pinch, through the gayly-colored and larger teapot, earthen still, through Wedgwood’s varied wares in which our patriotic grandmothers drank their wretched “Liberty Tea,” to the fine porcelain treasures of Worcester, Minton, Derby, Sèvres, and Dresden of to-day—a story of the growth of our nation in luxury and elegance.