Studio: international art (31.1904)

Reviews

meet with a thorough expert in any branch of
technical production who is also gifted, as is the
author of this delightful volume, with the pen of
the ready writer. Mr. Solon is not only a most
successful practical potter but a man of high
cultivation, who has the history of the art he
has made his profession at his finger-tips. " In
all branches of archaeological science," he says,
"the investigations of the historian are specially
directed at the present day towards the origins,''
and he adds, " the ceramic student feels somewhat
disappointed when he realises that he cannot
learn anything definite concerning the probationary
stage of the English china factories." For all that,
Mr. Solon has collected a vast amount of very in-
teresting information respecting the phases of
development that succeeded the initial one. He
sums up succinctly the essential differences be-
tween the earlier and the later products, gives
numerous and excellent reproductions, many of
them in colour, of every variety of English porce-
lain, from the simple dignified forms of Bow to the
ornate over-ornamented products of Rockingham.
" The veil," he remarks, " which had so long en-
shrouded the mystery of the translucid ware of the
East was lifted for ever by the German Bottger's
discovery of its real constituents, and his account
of the long struggle of English potters to compete
with their state-aided foreign rivals reads like a
romance." Even after Cookworthy had found in
Cornwall the essential elements of true porcelain,
the kaolin supplying the light almost transparent
body, the felspar the delicate glaze, many years
elapsed before German importations were really
supplanted to any extent by native work.

Memorials of Old Oxfordshire. Edited by P. H.
Ditch field, M.A., F.S.A. (London and Derby:
Bemrose.) 15$. net.—The editor of this charming
collection of essays is to be congratulated on the
able co-operation he has secured from experts on
the various branches of his subject. The writers,
however much they may differ in other respects,
are agreed in their reverent devotion to the
memories of the past, and their love for the fair
county of Oxfordshire, the many attractions of
which are liable to be overlooked through the
concentration of interest on its chief city. Yet,
even outside the University and its immediate
surroundings, the shire is full of significant historic
relics, with the aid of which the archaeologist is
able to build up a picture of it as it was centuries
before Walter de Merton founded the first college
by bestowing his estates on a community of
scholars who elected to reside at Oxford. The

editor himself discourses pleasantly on the traces
of the earliest inhabitants of the county ; Mr.
Evans on the quaint Rollright Stones and the
legends that have gathered about them; whilst
the romantic life stories of Broughton Castle,
Dorchester Abbey, and other famous buildings
are sympathetically told by different pens. Even
Witney and its woollen manufactory is not for-
gotten, and the volume closes with an essay on the
poets of Oxfordshire by May Sturge Henderson.

Greek Sculpture: Its Spirit and Principles. By
Edmund von Mach. (Boston, U.S.A. : Ginn &
Co.) 15.?. net,—In the opinion of the author of
this new work on the plastic art of Greece, the
tendency of the nineteenth century was to consider
it too much from the archaeological, and not enough
from the esthetic, point of view. " The spade of
the discoverer," says Mr. von Mach, "brought
long-forgotten treasures to light, scholars trained in
the severe school of philology arranged and classi-
fied the material, and little or nothing was left to
the art-critic." Such a treatment of the subject,
he adds, " made a clear understanding of Greek
sculpture impossible . . . and it now becomes our
duty in the twentieth century to introduce the
reader to that spirit." In these Introductory Re-
marks, which would really have been better omitted,
for they tend to prejudice the student against a
book that is full of original thought, the American
artist overlooks all that has been already done in
the desired direction by his European contempo-
raries, such as MM. Perrot and Chipiez, joint
authors of " L'Histoire de l'Art dans l'Antiquite,"
in the eighth volume of which Greek archaic
sculpture is subjected to thoroughly expert art-
criticism ; the Germans Schnasse, Kugler, Lubke,
and Overbeck, who certainly did not ignore the
esthetic side of antique sculpture; not to speak of
the Englishmen Eastlake, Murray, and Ruskin,
who were all undoubtedly in touch with its spirit.
Although Mr. von Mach cannot, therefore, sustain
the claim of being a pioneer, he is yet an excellent
guide to the neophyte, and he has, moreover, much
to say which throws new light on certain aspects
of the questions discussed, so that even the advanced
student may learn much from him. He writes in
a pure and vigorous style, his brief, incisive sen-
tences carrying conviction with them, as when he
says : " The beauty of the Parthenon was the result
of much clear thinking," or " the personal influence
of the Greek artists upon their community was due
to the fact that they felt themselves one with the
public." The numerous illustrations are thoroughly
representative, and a novel but useful feature is an

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