Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1885-10-09
ASS IN CHINA AND JAPAN.

The extreme antiquity of civilization
china is proved (if proof be wanted)
:, the fact that parts of the ..Shoo
ro"w were undoubtedly written more
han two thousand years B. c., when
(bs Chinese We're already acquainted
sHb writing. In these books are al
ns;ons to glass, which yield unmis-
[skable evidence of its antiquity. Thus
70 find it stated that the Emperor
Ebup. on receiving the crown from
Eaou. who abdicated 2145 B. c.; tex
mined the gem adorned turning
[nbere and the gem transverse tube,
hat he might regulate the seven d.
[pctors, or regularly governed bodies"
rho writer of this must have had some
constructed instrument connected with
kstronomy in his minds eye. The
(.shoo King" is full of evidence of a
Ferv high state of civilization in China:
nm, in one book we are told the wild
fribes brought tribute of oyster pearls
md strings OF pearls not quite round,
o Yu, 2004 B. c. If the Chinese un-
1erstood glass making they would soon
beein to copy these pearls; and we find
1nler Gu ii, about l40 B. c., a manu-
actory where false pearls were made
bfl eW u, a species Of glass made from
IN herb, probably fern. Our great
ignorance of ancient Chinese literature
makes it difficult to collect true inform
ktion on many points. We know they
Understood the art of glazing pottery
q very early date, and on this ac-
rount were possibly more careless
about glass making. Porcelain was in
vented, it is supposed, about 1856 B. c.,
the writing on the bottles found in
tombs was used in the century before
our era. The martyr god of porcelain
WAS a potter who threw himself into
the furnace one day, when from want
of fuel the falling fire would have
spoiled the contents of the kiln-an
hmexampled instance of devotion to his
art. The celebrated patra or aims
bowl of Buddha is alluded to by a Chi
ncse writer OF 1850, quoted by Mr.. Mes
hitt: sin front of the image of Bud
dha is a sacred bowl, which is made
neither of copper nor iron; it is of a
purple color and glossy. and when
Struck it sounds like glass" This bowl
may have been brought from the west
to Ccylon, but it proves an acquaint-
ance with glass on the part of the Chi
nese writer. A Portuguese traveller in
China, G. da Cruz, writing to Sebastian,
King of Portugal, about 1860, says at a
banquet given by avery rich merchant,
the house was built with q loft and
very faire, with many faire windows
and easements, and all of it was a mir
Tor;' what the mirrors were made of
he does not explain, nor if the case
mcnts were filled with glass, but this
is one of the earliest notices concerning
life Ill China, as the Arab, Ell Edrisi,
ll54, does not seem to have been him
self in China. He says: ''Djan kon is a
celebrated city, the Chinese glass is
made there" Dian kon has not been
satisfactorily identified with any exist
ing city, but the passage shows that
Chinese glass was supposed to exist.
M, Labarte thinks it probable that fine
porcelain, and not glass. is really
meant by Ell Edrisi, but an Arab of the
twelfth century is unlikely to have
made any confusion between
the two substances, with which
he must have been perfectly familiar.
Mr.. Nesbitt, who has collected together
many illusions to glass in the writings
of the early Jesuit missionaries, says
the words ''po Ii" were in use for q
glass at a very early time. Nearly all
French writer's on glass allude to the
tale of a piece of crystal being taken
in China for the real material Of which
heaven is made. The original narrator
of this account is Father Ricci, who
left Europe 1888 A. d. and spent some
Years in China; he states that he gave
a prism OF glass to a native convert,
one Chuitaso, who put it into a silver
case with gold chains, and adorned it
further with a writing that it was a
fragment of that matter whereof the
heavens consist. One was said to
offer him five hundred pieces of gold
soon after for it, which till Father
Matthew had presented his to the King
he would not sell; after that he set a
higher price and sold it," We may
suppose from this that colorless bril-
liant glass was unknown to the Chi
nese. The Russian ambassador, E.
ldes, who went to China in 1893, says
he was taken by command of the EN-
pcror to see various sights, among
them some ''jugglers, who, after many
other diverting tricks, played with
round balls of glass as large as a mans
mead at the point of a sharp stick, toss
ing them several ways without break
ing them or letting them fall, so it was
realizing surprising" He was also
taken to the markets and to various
shops, especially to a toyshop; the
owner had a fine garden, and among
other things showed him "a large
globe full of fish about a fin,
ger long, whose scales appeared
as if made of gold, but when
the scales fell off they were a beautiful
CRIMSON" Japan has SO long been a
sealed book to us that it is nearly I'M
possible to find any information as to
glass made there. Captain John Saris,
who sailed 1905 (Purchas' Pilgrim,
mes, } advises that merchants should
take to Japan ''drinking-glasses OF al
sorts, cans and cups, beer glasses, gilt
%peakers, and looking-glasses OF the
largest Sorts" This would lead us to
inter thai thosa articles were not made