“The friezes are masterpieces of Art as well as of manipulative skill. They reflect the highest credit on Messrs. Copeland and their Art-director, Mr. Abraham, by whom they have been produced, and who have thus inaugurated a new, and what we pronounce to be a successful style, of internal decoration--one that is sure to be followed in many a mansion and home of taste in our country and abroad. Mr. Macfarlane will have reason to be proud of his acquisition, and has the satisfaction of feeling, that with the aid of Messrs. Copeland and their skilled staff of artists, he has originated a novel feature in Art-decoration, and carried it to an enviably successful issue. Messrs. Copeland are renowned for the excellence of their work and for the true artistic feeling and skill which characterise everything that passes from their hands, and their present productions will, if that be possible, add to their celebrity.” Tiles for flower-boxes, lily-pans, garden-seats, slabs for chimney-pieces, table-tops, fire-places, &c., and for every other purpose, as well as door-plates, are also largely produced and highly decorated. In Parian--the next best material to marble--statuary and busts, as well as other objects, are extensively made. This is another speciality of the firm, and one the discovery of which belongs to them. It is, in fact, the development of the old and ever-famous Derby biscuit ware,[40] rendered finer and more commercially, as well as artistically, available by the careful attention of the Messrs. Copeland. It was introduced by them about 1846, and is said to have been then made at the suggestion of Gibson the sculptor; from that time to the present it has been extensively manufactured by every house--by Copeland’s, perhaps, more extensively than any other. Among the more recent of their finest works in Parian, are the “Infancy of Jupiter,” “Lady Godiva,” “Nora Creina,” the “Flute-player,” the “Reading Girl,” busts of “A Mother” and of “Love,” all by Monti; “Young England” and “Young England’s Sister,” a very charming pair by Halse; a “Shepherd Boy,” “Spring,” and “Summer,” by L. A. Malampre; and “Master Tom” and “On the Sea-Shore,” by Joseph Durham, R.A. Among their other special works, Foley’s “Ino and Bacchus,” Durham’s “Chastity” and “Santa Filomena,” Monti’s “Night” and “Morning,” and a score or two others, are brilliant examples. Besides figures, groups, and busts, a large number of other beautiful objects of various kinds are produced in Parian. [Illustration: Figs. 166 to 168.--Copeland’s Parian Figures.]