Another famous potter, Mokubei, who worked at Kioto about the same time, is said to have made great improvements in the moulds employed by him, especially in those used for copying old Chinese pieces. But we certainly cannot accept the statement that he was the first potter in Japan to use moulds. This same Mokubei is said to have copied the richly glazed stoneware of Kochi, a ware that had long been prized by the Japanese, and to which, or rather to the kindred porcelain, we have already referred. It is described as a hard pottery, with archaic moulded decorations, coated with lustrous glazes of green, purple, yellow, and golden-bronze. Mokubei also worked for the prince of Kishiu, and it would be interesting to know what relation, if any, he had with Zengoro and his Ô-niwa yaki.[126] SANDA CELADON.--The kilns set up at Sanda, a small town to the north-west of Osaka, by the feudal lord of the district, have acquired in Japan a great name on account of the celadon ware there made. This _Sanda-seiji_ was first produced at the end of the seventeenth century, and followed more closely the famous old heavy wares of Lung-chuan than did the more delicately finished celadon porcelain made about the same time at Ôkôchi in Hizen. In addition to these wares, the Japanese lay claim to an ancient celadon of native manufacture, and much ink has been spilt in Japan upon the question of the origin of certain archaic pieces preserved in temples and private collections. The bulk of the Sanda celadon, we should say, is a solid useful ware with small artistic pretensions. THE WARES OF OWARI AND MINO.--If, leaving Kioto, we take the old high-road to Yedo--the Tokaido--we pass through a succession of villages where the local wares are displayed in the stalls lining the route. Some of this pottery is not without merit, and historical associations give interest to more than one variety. But it is not till we have passed Nagoya, a large industrial town at the head of the Gulf of Owari, that we enter a true porcelain district--the only district in Japan that has vied with Hizen in the production of porcelain for domestic use and for exportation. Not far off is the village of Seto, the home of Toshiro; it was here that on his return from China, early in the thirteenth century, he set up the first kiln that produced in Japan a ware with any claims to artistic merit. But, as we have said at the beginning of this chapter, the ware made by Toshiro was no true porcelain, although the expression _Seto-mono_, derived from his native village, is used rather for porcelain than for other kinds of pottery. The term is, in fact, about equivalent to our word ‘china.’