Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1886-08-21
M A GLASS rAcro,.
noasrn Method. Of an Aasl.a. n.aal-


Modern Methods Of an Ancient Eiendi-
oraft-ArtistIc SKIN OF Decorators.
From the pot-room, one logically goes
10 the blowing-room, where the melted
glass is put into shape. This room al
ways strikes us as miniature Hades.
only the spirits fitting about are the
grimy glass blowers and their small boy
assistants. These men earn their money,
especially in midsummer heat. They
can discount the bees in their hive max
ing, and their sleight of hand and eye in
shaping the molten mass into lamp
shade or vase, with few simple tools OF
wood and iron, is something that out
matches the skill Of the whole brute Gre
alton. The race who can blow glass, as
at Sandwich, II 1t has no God to worship
shcsld turn to and worship itself. The
work so swift, unguided except by hand
and eye, Is truly wonderful.
The cutting shop" where the glass Is
ground and cut in ornament, puts US on
noting that glass making follows, like
almost everything else, the fashion. In
the old days flint glass adorned with
flowers or other simple designs from ma
ture was the rule. Now 1t Is the excep-
ton. The whole dish Is fretted over
with deep-cut sparkling lines and angles,
until in candle light It looks ablaze with
brilliants, rather ford and famboyant,
expensive and emphatic, and, above all,
en- vogue. In the decoration rooms,
added Of late years, where glass paint
ing goes on, one finds that the win of
the great public has the upper hand in
deciding what sort Of work a popular
glass house shall turn out. Indeed this
factory reflects the public taste in glass,
following, rather than directing. There is
hardly more difference between steel
engraving Of AIRY Scholars @Dante and
Beatrice" or of his "Faith" and colored
print Of some modern French artist than
there is between Sandwich glass Of old
and now. The change, too, is exactly in
the same direction. Everything now
runs to color, and generally Of very pro-
nounced shades, though we saw crimson
maroon lamp shades, and vases of such
subdued and blended native tints as re-
minded us Of some gracious romance or
poem read or told in soft sunset.
Yet, take sample of public demand
and supply. The Morgan peach-blow
vase sold for $4,000. Here they turn
out fac-similes of that vase for a sum
ridiculously less. and plenty Of them. In
the decoraton-rooms young men and
women were painting on glass, which is
afterwards burned IN ovens, as else all
the colors would remain fusible, being
made with oxides Of gold, silver, etc.
The overseer is an Englishman from
Staffordshire, who says that English
glass decoration is inferior to ours; that
developed public taste will surely de-
velop artistic glasswork; that art schools,
and plenty of them, are needed to de-
velop progress in glass, and that as
America turns to art she will help this
establishment to higher future. 1t was,
also, incidentally learned that the artistic
skill Of decorators here was about equal
as between men and women, with the
balance, perhaps, little towards the
men, who take to it as livelihood,
while the women generally move
through it to marriage and wedding
trousseau. AS yet no genius in glass
decoration has appeared here. Sand
witch Dfass,l Cor, Boston Transcript,