[92] It would be convenient to have a name to include the whole series--the _flambé_, the _sang de bœuf_, the lavender Yuan, and perhaps also the peach-bloom and the ‘robin’s egg.’ I would propose to include _all these classes_ under the head of _transmutation glazes_. [93] A French writer compares the effect to the ‘palette d’un coloriste montrée sous un morceau de glace’ (E. de Goncourt, _La Maison d’un Artiste_). [94] There were many kinds of ‘furnace transmutations’ known to the Chinese, mostly of a miraculous nature (see Bushell, p. 219). [95] When applied to _the whole surface_, a similar slip forms the ground on which the decoration is painted in the case of many kinds of European and Saracenic fayence, but in such ware the slip is used to conceal a more or less coarse and coloured paste. [96] It may, however, be noticed, on close examination, that the crackles do not seem to be developed in the lower glaze covered by the slip. This would rather point to both the first and the second coats of glaze, as well as the intermediate slip, being all applied before the firing. [97] Not that we need claim any great age for these plates, but it is in such places that old types (as _e.g._ the celadon) are likely to continue in fashion. [98] We may perhaps connect the first steady export of ‘blue and white’ direct to Europe with the establishment of the Dutch at Nagasaki, where they probably employed Chinese workmen. [99] So what is by far the most successful imitation of Chinese ‘blue and white’ ever produced in Europe was made by the Dutch, in the enamelled fayence of Delft, about the middle of the century. [100] In Japanese art also we find the prunus as a symbol of the approaching spring, but there the branches are covered with freshly fallen snow. The contrast of the weather in early spring, in China and Japan respectively, could not be better expressed--by ice in the one case, by soft thawing snow in the other. [101] Dr. Zimmermann, the curator of the Dresden Museum, regards the black division of the _famille verte_ as a product of the _demi grand feu_, _i.e._ he holds that the black and green was painted on the biscuit. But this is certainly not the case with the fully developed examples. I may say that this class is only represented at Dresden by some small roughly painted plates. [102] We find it so used, however, upon the Japanese ‘Kakiyemon’ porcelain, some of which cannot be much later than the middle of the seventeenth century. [103] Since writing this I have discovered a tall-necked bottle of this ware at South Kensington, which is stated to have been purchased in Persia (PL. XX.). [104] That is to say, no attempt was ever made to imitate the material--the hard paste. [105] An important collection of armorial china was bequeathed to the Museum in 1887 by the Rev. Charles Walker.