The Warner sun. (Warner, Brown Co., Dakota [S.D.]) 1885-1???, 1888-08-03
GLASS " CHINA ANp JAPAN.
Aliusion TO Its Manufacture Many Centuries
Before the Christian Era-Ihs Treasures
Of the MikadOs.

= StAAu" ~ PAbNSA M plVoA hO NanteuJ
by the fact that parts of the '.ShoO
King" were undoubtedly written
two thousand years b, O., when the
Chinese were already acquainted with
writing. In these books are illusions
to glass, which yield unmistakable evil
denec of its antiquity. Thus we find
it stated that the Emperor Shun, on
receiving The crown from Yaou, who
addicted 2145 b. c., examined the
gem adorned turning sphere and the
gem transverse tube, that he might
regulate the seven directors, or regu-
larry governed bodies The writer
Of this must have had some constructed
instrument connected with astronomy
in his minds eye. The '.Shoo King
IS full Of evidence of a very high state
Of civilization in China; thus in one
book we are told The wild tribes
brought tribute Of oyster pearls and
strings of pearls not quite round, TO
Yu, 2004 B. @. If the Chinese under
stood glass making they would soon
begin to copy these pearls; and we
find under Gu ii, about 140 B. c., a
mandatory where false pearls were
made of lieu u, a species OF glass made
from an herb, probably fern. Our
great ignorance of ancient Chinese
literature makes it difficult to collect
true information on many points. We
know they understood the art CT glaz-
ing pottery at a very early date, and
on this account were possibly more
careless about glass making. Porce-
lain was invented, it is supposed, about
1856 b. c.; the writing on the bottles
found in tombs was used in the cent
fury 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 unexampled instance of
devotion to his art. The celebrated
pGtra or aims bowl of Buddha is all
luded to by a Chinese writer of 1850,
quoted by Mr.. Nesbitt: ''Ia front of
the image of Buddha is q sacred bowl,
which IS made neither of copper nor
iron; it is of a purple color and glossy,
glass This howl NAV have
been brought from the west to Cey-
Ion, but it proves an acquaintance
with glass on the part of the Chinese
writer. A Portuguese traveller in Chi
ma, G. da Cruz, writing to Sebastian,
king of Portugal, about 1860, says at a
banquet given by a very rich mer-
chant, 'the house was built with a loft
and very faire, Nth many faire win
dows and easements, and all of it was
a mirror what the mirrors were
made of he does not explain, nor If
the easements were filled with glass,
but this is one of the earliest notices
concerning life in China, as the Arab
Ell Edrisi, 1154, does not seem to have
been himself in China. He says /:
Dian kon is q celebrated city, the Chi
nese glass is made there" Djaa koH
has not been satisfactorily identified
with any existing city, but the pass
age shows that Chinese glass Yves sup
I posed to exist. ~. Labarte thinks it
probable that fine porcelain, and not
glass; is really meant by FL Edrisi, but
an Arab of the twelfth century is un-
likely to have made any confusion be-
tween the two substances, with which
he must have been perfectly familiar.
| Mr.. Nesbitt, who has collected togeth-
er many illusions to glass in the writ
ings of the early Jesuit missionaries,
saws the words '.po lI'' were in use for
a glass at a very early time. Nearly
all French writers on glass allude to
the tale of a piece of crystal being Ia
ken in China for the real material of
which heaven is made. The original
narrator of this account is Father
Bicci, who left Europe 1888 A. ID. and
spent some year in China; he states
that he gave a prism of glass TO a ma
tive convert, one Chuitaso, who put it
into a silver ease with gold chains.
and adorned it further with a writ
ing 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 be would not sell; after
that he set a higher price and sold it."
We may suppose from this that color
less brilliant glass was unknown
to the Chinese. The Russian am
bassador, L. Ides, who went to
China In 1868, says he was taken By
command OF the emperor to see
various sights, among them some
ssiugglers, who, after many other di-
yertEng tricks, played With round balls
of glass as large as a mans head at
the point OF a sharp stick, tossing
them several ways without breaking
them or letting fall. so it was really
surprising He was also taken to the
markets and to various shops. espec-
Tally to a toy store; the owner had a
fine garden, and among other things
showed him "a large globe full Of fish
about a finger long, whose scales APP
peared as il made Of gold, hat when
the scales fell Off they were a beauti-
full crimson" Japan has soIopg been
esealed book to us thar Ii is nearly
impossible to find any information as
TO glass made there. Capt. John
Sarfs, who sailed 1908 (Purchas' Pill
crfmmes'), advises that merchants
should take 70 japan drinking
glasses of al softss cans and cups,
beer glasses, gilt beakers, and look
ing glasses If the largest sorts.
This would lead us g infer that those
articles were not made in the country.
Kaempfer, who published his history
OF Japan in 1927, docs not mention
glass beyond that required for glazing
the porcelain, which he describes as
most prized when nearly transparent.
N.4 w. ~ 49, N ~ AAL.-MMA 49,