Now all these manifest features of industrial art are to be attributed to the collections of those who have dedicated their time and experience to the gathering together of various specimens of the art of past ages. The treasures of the Kensington Museum and those in Paris, Vienna, and elsewhere, which have lately been thrown open to the public, are of infinite practical utility. Yet I will venture to say that the individuals who collected these arttreasures commenced their pleasing labours in the first instance from the simple desire to gratify personal vanity, or with the less noble thirst of gain. Say nay who will, there is no greater pleasure to the collector than that of buying cheap and selling dear, even if money be no great object. Indeed, I have known more than one collector sell his whole collection for the mere pleasure of recommencing his researches for another, or to obtain some precious and unique relic, the possession of which shall elevate him above all vulgar connoisseurs. Depend upon it the collector is more or less the slave of vanity, although he may be also a man of taste. My experience tells me

that there are people who claim as their own a rare Venetian glass, a noble Wedgwood vase, an exquisite Sèvres cup, or an elegant Dresden group, or any perfect or rare object of art, who would like to smash every one else's vase or group, as the Dutch tulip-grower would have crushed under his feet the rival bulb of a rare and precious flower, that it might bloom in no other garden than his own.

The amateur collector who wishes to indulge in a little traffic with his friends need not be ashamed of dabbling in the business of the bric-a-brac merchant. Very aristocratic individuals have dealt in such merchandise. His Highness the Duke of Brunswick dealt in diamonds; and the Duc de Morny was a dealer in pictures, as was Marshal Soult before him. When once a man becomes a collector, he can hardly escape becoming a seller.

The Children of Israel have always been con

spicuous dealers in the fine arts; and the Rothschilds are well-known collectors of the finest arttreasures of the past.

Kings and queens, emperors and men of high degree, for centuries past have loved the ceramic

art with no common passion; while, by an assiduous cultivation of the same art, men of low birth and little education have raised themselves to honour and high estate. Who that dwells with pleasure on the search for bric-à-brac has not perused the fascinating life of the poor potter Palissy? What collector does not remember the struggles and triumphs of the noble-minded Wedgwood? What worshipper of art has not listened to anecdotes of Böttcher and De Blaquier?

The Chinese emperors by high rewards alone obtained the then unrivalled egg-shell china, since so gracefully imitated, and sold for so low a price. The Celestials testified their admiration of the inventor by enrolling the potter-martyr in the catalogue of deities.

The Duke of Urbino introduced the highly artistic, if not the graceful, majolica.

Henry II. and Diana de Poitiers gave the name to the varied beauties of Faience; while that prince and his consort, Catherine de' Medici, developed the genius of Palissy. Augustus the Strong, Maria Theresa, Frederick the Great, and other reigning

princes of Germany, founded and brought to perfection at their own expense the porcelain manufactories of their respective countries. Russia, where day by day the art is improving, and where it has indeed already obtained considerable celebrity, owes to Elizabeth and Catherine the Second its progress. In Italy royal patronage also nur

tured the ceramic art.

Charles III.—whose memory be honoured for this single act-founded the unrivalled manufacture of Capo di Monte and Buen Retiro, to my taste the most interesting and refined of all ornamental china, not excepting Sèvres, which Pompadour's influence over Louis XV. helped to bring to remarkable perfection; while the bewitching Jeanne Marie Vaubernier secured the lovely rosecolour so well known and so highly esteemed among connoisseurs as Rose du Barry.

At home we have as high, if not higher, claims to the perfection of ceramic art. William, Duke of Cumberland, supported the far-famed manufactures of Chelsea, while the name of Queen Charlotte added to Wedgwood's glory.

Men of all ages, all countries, all ranks have devoted themselves to the worship of this beautiful in art.

I have known a dignitary of the Church, a man of high attainments, a Christian in all the attributes of life, to go home from a sale with a bilious attack because he had failed to secure a group bearing the monogram of Carl Theodore, for which porcelain—and I fully sympathized with him—he had an intense liking. One of the keenest sportsmen of my acquaintance was as eager to obtain a Sèvres cup that he had been longing for as to kill Ay, and two of our Byng, were not only

his fox after an hour's run.

bravest admirals, Nelson and intense lovers of the ceramic art, but bric-a-brac hunters of no common experience: in the families of each are retained valuable relics of their labours.

Seeing that the collection of rare and precious examples of art has now become a fashion as well as a passion, I venture to think that the friendly advice of a very moderately experienced collector may be of some value; and with that belief I propose to tell my readers how for years, amid the