The printed marks indicating the pattern have, in addition to the name of the pattern (“Convolvulus,” “Trent,” “Nunthorpe,” &c.) the initials of the firm, as “M. P. & Co.” for “Middlesborough Pottery Company,” and “I. W. & Co.” for “Isaac Wilson & Co.” * * * * * _Wolviston Pottery_, now discontinued, formerly produced yellow ware. * * * * * _Coxhoe Pottery_, also discontinued, produced Sunderland ware. ALNWICK. There were formerly pot-works here; but no trace of them is now left, save the name of the street, “Potter Gate,” where they existed. The former name of this street was, in 1567, “Barresdale Street,” but potters having there located themselves, it became gradually changed. Another old street in this town now known as “Clayport,” was formerly called “Clay-peth,” _peth_ being a provincialism for a steep road, and _clay_ the nature of the soil; probably it was this clay that the Alnwick potters turned to good account. CHAPTER II. Liverpool Pottery--Shaw’s Delft Ware--Shaw’s Brow--Zachariah Barnes--Sadler and Green--Transfer Printing--Wedgwood’s Printed Ware--Drinkwater’s Works--Spencer’s Pottery--Richard Chaffers--Reid and Co.’s Works--The Penningtons--Patrick’s Hill Works--The Flint Pottery--Herculaneum Works--Warrington Pottery and China--Runcorn--Prescot--St. Helen’s--Seacombe. LIVERPOOL. It would, perhaps, scarcely be expected that in such a busy, bustling, and gigantic place of enterprise and commercial activity as Liverpool--in the midst of shipping of every description, and surrounded by the most enormous and busy undertakings of one kind or other--we should successfully look for the full and perfect accomplishment of so quiet, so unostentatious, so peaceful, and so delicate an art as that of the potter. But thus it is; and Liverpool, which counts its docks by tens, its wharves and stores by hundreds, its shipping by thousands, and its wealth by millions--which can boast its half-million inhabitants, its overground and under-ground railways, and every appliance which skill and enterprise can give or trade and commerce possibly require--which has undertaken the accomplishment of some of the most wonderful and gigantic schemes the world ever knew, and has carried them out in that spirit of commendable and boundless energy that invariably characterises all its actions--has not been behindhand with its more inland and more modest neighbours in the manufacture of delicate porcelain, and of pottery of the most fragile nature. It is more than probable that in mediæval times the coarse ware of the period--the pitchers, porringers, dishes, &c.--was made on the banks of the Mersey. The first mention of pottery, however, occurs in 1674, when the following items appear in the list of town dues:--