Waterbury evening Democrat., 1904-09-24
SEEING THE FAIR
 IN DETAIL

TS0ilu9 OT ~ @iOJVOO T0aFs-~wVU U1F0SET0t
 Things of Jade = Screens a Few
 Inches High Worth From $500 to
 $5,o0o - Jade Snuff Bottles Carved
 From the Solid CrystaI-Keen Appre-
 citation For Old Brio-a -brae-T TempIe
 Gongs of Hammered. Brass = Silver
 Treasures In Countless ShaPes-Ab-
 sence of Scientific Knowledge In Chi
 na Proper-Primitive Mills and Other
 Things That Make Much Work With
 Small Result.
 ESPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE BY
 MARK BENNITT.]
 A pearl of great price sits Queenly on a velvet throne In one of the show cases in this Chinese empire of the Liberal Arts palace. Just to look at 1t, which all may do, seems great honor, and to touch it is like feeling of ten years salary in advance This pearl is almost as big as the bulging eyes that gaze at it, and 1t shines on and on with iridescent softness and luster that gladdens the heart. It Is the joy that thing of beauty forever is. according to the late MT. Keats. The aabby workman who mace 1t In his little two sided shop beneath the oceans flood and mud must have toiled long and arduously, for nacre Is no cheap product when one has to extract it from his drinking water and lay 1t on, an invisible thinness at time, like a Chinese artisan makes a lacquered tray with dozen varnishings. No piacard tells the value of this treasure as measured by those who fashion pearls Ten thousand dollars is the Chinese price expressed in American figures and the weight is thirty carats. It was found near the Pescadores is- lands, which belong to France and which lie In the Formosan strait oppo- site the province of Fukien.
 Jade is a favorite material with She Chinese carvers and lapidaries. The rich green jade is by far the hand somest and most costly. A little carved screen the size of an old fashioned pane of glass ' by inches is priced at $5 5,0O0 But this is unusual for jade. IA white screen about the same size is $500.
 Snuff is Chinese indulgence, much as it used to be in America when our grandsires wore silver shoe buckles and bicycle pants. The Chinese snuff taker performs sort of sleight of hand feat when he takes the bit Af sneeze powder. The snuff is kept in bottles, tightly corked. When snuff time comes the cork is removed and a bit of the powder is taken on tiny arrow shaped spatula attached to the cork and laid on the second joint of the left thumb. This part of the hand Is then run along beneath the nostrils while the thrush of air sweeps the powder clean. The operation is very cleanly, deftly and delicately done, quite an improvement on the wasteful way of delivering it to the nostrtls in pinches.
 mentioned snuff because wanted to mention the jade snuff bottles. These bottles are fashioned from the solid jade crystal and are as shapely as blown bottles. But they are worth $10 to $25 apiece. Gut glass is plebeian be- side carved jade.
 
 Old China is very fond of old china. The bric-a-brac collector of the orient has as keen sense of the beautiful and as fine a sentiment about the old things associated with the remote past as anybody who haunts the faience and antiquary shops of an American city. Here is an old bit of crockery made in the time of Emperor Sung Chiu thousand years ago. The price is 70 cents for each year of it's age. Here are a sparkling white jade bowl for $1O0 and incense bowls and jars to sweeten the homes and lives of many a family. The oldest vase here was made during the Ming dynasty, about 300 years ago, and it is valued at $s,0oo.
 Instead of ringing a clurch bell in China the sexton of the temple thumps a resonant drum made of hammered brass. Some of the temple drums that bear the marks of violent exercise for many generations are here to be looked at and thought about by Christian and pagan alike. Few sounds are sweeter than the vesper bells, with all the comforting thoughts that vesper bells should bring, and if the temple drums fesound in after years in the hearts of our Chinese friends as do the village bells in the hearts of those who dwelt in their youth within their sound their mission is worthy one.
 The Chinese are wonder workers in silver. What can be prettier or more dalntily done than the entrance to the emperor's palace as 1t is here in silver? Here, too, are the emperor's throne, Chinese war junk and flower boat all In silver, delicately wrought and skillfully engraved.
 As an example of patience and skill shall point out to you an ivory ball carved from large elephants tusk, containing twenty-seven other balls, Dne ball within another, all beautifully carved and latticed in an intelligently designed pattern. This is the work of D Cantonese who gave two years of his life to the task. The value set upon it is $2O0, and that Is far from