The Sun.
London, England, 1853-01-22 00:00:00

THE EARL OF CARLISLE ON POTTERY.

The annual festival of the Potters' School of Design,
rich usually excites considerable interest in the pot-

1.
ry district of Staffordshire, was held at Buislem. The
ordinary attractions of the meeting were greatly en-
hanced by the announcement that the Earl of Carlisle
would take the chair ; and it was not therefore surpris-
ing that the spacious room in which the inhabitants as-
combled should very quickly, after the doors were
thrown open on Wednesday night, be filled •to over-

flowing.

The Earl of CARLISLE, who was received with much
cheering, opened the business of the evening by saying
—Ladies and gentlemen, I appear before you on the
present occasion, in compliance with the invitation
,ich I was honoured by receiving in the course of
f. autumn, to attend and take the chair at the annual
ig of the Schools of Design in the Potteries' Dis-
(cheers)—and although I hope, therefore, that I
t be arraigned for presumption in doing so by
etc present company, yet I certainly feel that I cannot
o easily acquit myself on that account. Neither
ny education nor my habits of life, nor my acquisitions
,y reading, have qualified me to hold discourse upon
.is ; and I am clearly sinning against the old
Inid down long ago by the poet Horace, which may
lir. rendered—

shali

" Of pottery, let potters speak !"

(Great cheering and laughter.) While there are such
cistinguished manufacturers as Mr. Ridgway, Mr. Min-
ton, and others around me, I find myself not listening
to them, but occupying the chair in their place, and I
really feel that I can scarcely hazard an observation in
their presence without the danger of making some awful
Hunder. (Cheers and laughter.) I know there are so
ne,ny essential, though by me ill-understood, differences
between pottery and crockery, and hardware and stone-
ware, and finestoneware and ironstoneware, and earthen-
ware and firedware, and japan and china, and porce-
lain hard and porcelain soft, and dell and eggshell, and
enamel and tiles, and terracotta and bisque and
Parian, and all sorts of crockery and pottery, without
going into such geographical distinctions as Sevres and
Dresden, and Chelsea and Staffordshire. (Loud cheers
and. laughter.) All I feel certain of is, that, if Igo into
particulars, I shall make a tremendous smash—(cheers
end laughter)—and effectually produce you that which
can be represented by nothing better than the familiar
figure, which I hope may never be realised by any here,
a bull in one of your own china-shops. (Great cheer-
ing.) We are met, however, to promote the effi-
ciency of what may be called the ceramic department.
I know not how far the niceties of scholarship have tra-
-veiled amongst you, or that I am not already blamed for
aot calling it "keramic ;" but I only hope that with
he name will be imparted the grace of classic antiquity.
(Cheers.) There are, however, considerations which
might well warrant any one, however unskilled and
unversed in this particular craft, but yet who might
feel an interest in the welfare and prosperity of the
country generally, to express his sympathy with the
objects which have called together the present as-
sembly. lam informed that there are 200 factories
in England now engaged in pottery, with an
annual amount of production of the value of
2,000,000/. sterling. In the year before last, as much
as 84,000,000 of pieces of pottery were exported from
this kingdom ; and, in the vast network of industry
which covers all this neighbourhood about us, there
tenet be fully 60,000 people employed in this species of
manufacture. (Rear, hear.) I conceive that to men-
tion these bare statistical facts is a more real and im-
posing tribute to the importance of the pottery manufac-
ture, than it would be to dwell upon the venerable an-
Cejuity of its origin, or on the repute and dignity with
v uch it appears to have been invested in all ages of
:mankind. (Cheers.) You must all of you be familiar
with the frequent metaphors derived from the potter and
his art in the Bible itself. The limits of Grecian con-
quest and of Roman empire are still defined by the ves-
Liges found, from time to time, of their pottery; and in
instances the names of successful artificers in clay
7,..ve been "married to immortal song." (Loud cheers.)
her, however grand may have been the uses to which
this iegenious and delicate handicraft has been put
in successive generations of the world—whether to hold
the ashes, or to record the achievements, of the illus-
trious dead, or to reward the victors in the public games,
cre in the musical or poetical contests of the classic ages ;
or—more ignoble appropriation—to adorn the cabinets
- and the toilets of the voluptuous favourites of monarchs;
er to attest the better-earned gratitude due to such be-
wrectors of the human race as our peerless Wellington
—(cheers)--I feel that you will agree with me that this
art finds its highest and most appropriate vocation when
it is made to subserve to the daily service, and minister
to the convenience of, millions, while it excites and de-
velopes a taste for refinement and beauty among the thick
masses of mankind. (Loud cheers.) This brings me
more directly to the special object of our meeting to-
gether here to-night. I have just intimated that the
peculiar aim of your art ought to be to make the
h ,gliest amount of beauty minister to and subserve
tile greatest extent of use. Now, with respect to use, I
think we may safely trust the practical, straightforward,
net over-romantic genius of our countrymen with find-
free- out what would be most wanted, what the most
welcome, what would suit the greatest number of con-
eureers ; but I am not sure that we can as implicitly
rely on their unaided and uninstructedaptitude to evince
the best artistic discrimination, to employ the most
happy combination of colours, or to select the most fault-
less shapes and proportions in the form of their ware. I
think, however, it would be both unjust and illiberal not
to admit in these respects, as in others more essential,
,at a great advance has been recently made. (Cheers.)
is not here, in the heart of the district which gave
- rth to Wedgewood—(cheers)—and to others, subse-
etly, of almost equal renown, several of whom I am
now to see around me—it is not in the neighbour-
hood of the British Etruria, for which Flaxman modelled,
and in which Wedgewood wrought, that I should think of
wing the language of disparagement or of discourage-
;ate) t. (Cheers.) May I not, too, in our own day,
_-far to the beautiful new manufacture called Parian,
• aich combines so much beauty of material with so much
eepa,city for exquisite outline and form (which I believe
WU may call exclusively our own), and evidenced by the
lobe, the Andromeda, the Dorothea, and the Vintage.
(!.;heers.) But let me remind you—and you may recur
to it with just pride---of the distinguished position
which Staffordshire occupied in the great Exhibition
of 1851. (Cheers.) Where was it in the thick crowd of
all the races of the world, and in the rich array of all the
productions of. mankind—where was it that, day after
day, and week after week, from the first opening of the
doors at morning to the last crash of the gong at even—
where was the densest mass, and where the most difficult
means of passage? If you ask me, I should point to that
portion of the gallery which overhung the angle of the
northwest transept--(loud cheers)—and from the • con-
ant gathereng and the untiring interest thereby ex-
pressed, it is right to infer that Staffordshire occupied no
mean position in that central mart of the productions of
the world. (Cheers.) But it is one thing to droop and
despond, it is another thing to presume and stagnate—
(loud cheers)—and though I learn that from the manu-
factory at Sevres, now again an imperial establishment,
and from France there are now exported wares of this
kind to the value of 800,0001. a-year----we may take
courage from the circumstance that we have all the ele-
ments of success before us. We have a great choice of
material, a great command of fuels, a great supply of in-
telligent workmen, an increased appreciation of the true
principles and laws of art, and a larger share of atten-
tion bestowed on such objects, both byindividual patrons
end by the public generally ; only, I must respectfully
a el: iind you that, in the faCe of the competition of the
there is still an ample call for exertion, and if
there be not progress, there is likely to be falling off and
decay. (Cheers.) It is here that I think the establishment
and encourageinent of schools of design come to be of such
• first-rate importance—(cheers)—and if ever there were a
• (listrict, and if ever there were a species of manufacture,
which they seem pre-eminently adapted and required, I
iould say it was the district in which we are now met, and
aware that the art of design comprehends both the
• ruri:` composition of the pattern and the proper admix-
of the clay. Well, so far it may be said to
eable also totextile fabrics, in which excellence inbe colour
and pattern, too,
regard to shape is indispensable ; but excellence with
cannot be said to be so indispensable as
respects dress, or we should not hear so much of long
-waists and
crushmotenuietss, or speak of ampler or more con-
tracted car
((great laughter.) But, in the
pottery manufacture there is portion of the composition
et" a piene—whether that olfs ntlin rdeeparer, the modeller,
‘e- tae gilder—in which the art ol;
untried
has not its ap-
T , ,e,-eriate place. (Cheers.) Nor is it ans tmrimedenodr atne-unnigchet.r-
-v experiment that we are met to recommend
d
T,ee, Pottery Schools of Design have alr
ead
Ife
recognised and highly creditable footing.
.as I said before, that I am not a
person qualified to
g: we an opinion on such a point ; or, even if I were, I
,sight almost suspect in myself, or, at least give growl ds
t:er others to suspect, a tendency not uncommon amongst
>eesons in the habit of addressing meetings—a tendency
) say things to conciliate the favour, and to smooth
e complacency, of those gathered before them—but
ppily, with reference to your schools of design, I am
'e to refer to more authentic sources for the due dis-
ution of praise. (Cheers.) There has been, as I
:stand, in former years, an uniform commendation
specimens of drawing sent up by the Potteries
.ee of Designinspection to Somerset Rouse the
for
. there ; and the still more signal success which at-
nded their production this Lest year is best attested by
le fact, that the awards assigned to it by the Department
rractical Art exceed the proportion obtained by any
ties e provincial schools in the country. Most happy
,;0‘ I to find on this platform both time gentlemen who
BalJerintend. the department of practical art—Mr. Cole
IZe(ler (Cheers.) - ) have both contri-
-1,,,,a , a io. aeer.. They
various ways to the success and development of
mostL,irilentliztin this country—(cheers)— and they are of
competent to lay down proper principles
imue-6,,ytornurergiutuidauze• I learn, likewise, thal two of the
last year, been pupils from these schools have, in the
ed to
(Loud cheers.) I truste Government scholarships.
inyhis precedent may be the means
of inducing other yowl them this district, and espe-
cially those concerned g'in
avail themselves of the advantaP:sttlrY manufacture, to
offered to them
more extensively even than theyghaveellherto done. And
1 would most earnestly counsel you not to be deterred

council.