We have seen some large dishes decorated with raised masks, strapwork, &c. and painted with grotesques on a white ground, and subject panels, and other grandiose pieces which are ascribed to the Urbino artists, but which may in equal likelihood be attributed to the Lanfranchi of Pesaro. A triangular plateau in the possession of Mrs. Hope has the character of their finest productions. [Illustration] The art at Pesaro rapidly declined after 1560, wanting the encouragement of a reigning ducal court; and Passeri ascribes much evil influence to what he considers the bad taste of preferring the unmeaning designs of the oriental porcelain, which was greatly prized by the wealthy, and the painting after the prints of the later German school of Sadeler, &c. to the grander works of the old masters; the landscapes were, however, well executed. He gives us also a history of the revival of the manufacture in his own time, under the influence and encouragement of the cardinal prelate Ludovico Merlini. In 1718 there was only one potter at Pesaro, Alfonzo Marzi, who produced the most ordinary wares. In 1757 signor Giuseppe Bertolucci, an accomplished ceramist of Urbania, in conjunction with signor Francesco di Fattori, engaged workmen and artists and commenced a fabrique, but it was soon abandoned. Again in 1763 signors Antonio Casali and Filippo Antonio Caligari, both of Lodi, came to Pesaro and were joined by Pietro Lei da Sassuolo of Modena, an able painter on Maiolica; they established a fabrique producing wares of great excellence hardly to be distinguished from the Chinese. In the Debruge-Labarte collection was a one-handled jug or pot, painted with flowers in white medallions on a blue ground, and on the foot engraven in the paste-- “Pesaro 1771.” A manufacture at present exists of painted tiles for pavement, removed to Pesaro from Urbania, and which at one time produced vases and plates in the manner of the Urbino istoriati pieces as also lustred wares after the style of M. Giorgio. It has, we are informed, ceased making these imitations and now confines itself to the first-named class of goods. CHAPTER XII. GUBBIO AND CASTEL DURANTE.