Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images available at The Internet Archive) [Illustration: WEDGWOOD PORTLAND VASE] POTTERY AND PORCELAIN, _FROM EARLY TIMES DOWN TO THE PHILADELPHIA EXHIBITION OF 1876_. BY CHARLES WYLLYS ELLIOTT. WITH ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTY-FIVE ILLUSTRATIONS, AND THE MORE IMPORTANT MARKS AND MONOGRAMS. NEW YORK: D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 549 & 551 BROADWAY. 1878. COPYRIGHT BY D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 1877. PREFACE. What we have attempted has been to gather and present, in a way to be easily understood, the most important facts respecting "Pottery and Porcelain." The study of this interesting subject has for more than a century been constant in Europe, and notably so during the last twenty-five years. A correct knowledge of it may now almost be called a liberal education. In the United States something has been done; and the public mind is now asking, "What is it that makes 'pottery and porcelain' so attractive to scholars, statesmen, women, and wits?" In some degree we have answered this question. My part of the work has been to gather where I could such historical and technical facts and such illustrations as seemed most valuable, not only to the student but to the collector. Many of these came from Europe, of course, where since Queen Anne's day the love of "old china" has at times risen to enthusiasm. But I have drawn from our own collections whenever it has been possible. In the preparation and engraving of the illustrations I hope the judicious critic, as well as the judicious public, will give due credit to the publishers and their artists, who, it seems to me, deserve great praise for having so well done what they have undertaken to do. Permit me to say a word for _collectors_. Busy men who are making railways and coal-pits, under the pleasing illusion that they are developing the country more than the rest of us, are apt to think a man with any hobby except that of making money is wasting his time.