pments was so great that they were
regarded as triumphs in themselves, when they were only "means to an
end."

Since that period the development of pottery and porcelain has followed
two main directions: (1) an attempt on the part of manufacturers to
produce the most artistic results possible with modern processes and
methods, and (2) the interesting and valuable efforts of those
individual potters in every country with whom art was the first
consideration and commercial production was disregarded.

Though the English pottery factories were of such paramount importance
in the first half of the 19th century, it must be remembered that some
of the oldest factories in Europe were still alive and active. The royal
factories in Sevres, Meissen, Berlin, Vienna, St Petersburg and
elsewhere, surviving the wreck of the Napoleonic Wars, continued at the
expense of their respective states, to produce porcelains which were the
legitimate development of their work during the 18th century.

_Meissen and Berlin._--At Meissen, efforts were made to improve the
technical process in use, but, unfortunately, the old Meissen wares had
already become valuable, and they were reproduced, marks included, until
all initiative was destroyed, and the factory continued to live, mainly,
on its old reputation.

At Berlin, the financial troubles of the Prussian monarchy throughout
the early years of the 19th century were severely felt, so that a
cheaper class of porcelain was manufactured. The only innovations that
can be ascribed to the factory during this period, though highly
esteemed at the time, form striking examples of the artistic decadence
of the period. Such was the lace-work decoration made by dipping lace in
porcelain slip so that on firing the thread burned away, leaving a
porcelain facsimile; another was the production of slabs of porcelain
modelled in such a way that on viewing the piece by transmitted light it
appeared like a picture painted _en grisaille_.

From the artistic point of view there is little to be said for the
majority of productions of the Berlin factory, but nowhere in the world
has greater attention been paid to the technical and scientific problems
of porcelain manufacture, and this establishment has rendered the
greatest service in the development of the important chemical and
electrical industries of Germany by the splendid appliances it has
invented for scientific use.

Since 1870 the works, removed to Charl