, THE WEDGWOODS. 



the first ^rude^and coarse clay vessels for receiving the 

 ashes of the dead, to every conceivable appliance of the 

 table, the toilet, or the drawing room of the living from the 

 thick and clumsy half-baked urn, to the finest, most costly, 

 and exquisitely beautiful porcelain services and ornaments 

 the art of the potter has been associated with every race, 

 with every age, and with every occupation of the occupiers 

 of the soil, and has thus been connected with their everyday 

 life, their homes, and their callings. A history of this art, 

 then, must, more than any other, illustrate the history of 

 man, and the progress of his intellectual development, and 

 must form, when properly considered, a key to his civilisation 

 and to his social advancement. 



This history, as I have said, has yet to be written, and 

 will, sooner or later, form a work of surpassing interest and 

 value. Introductory to the memoir of one of the greatest 

 potters the world ever saw JOSIAH WEDGWOOD I have 

 thought that a slight sketch of the progress of the art in the 

 earliest times in the district which gave him birth, and in 

 which he " lived and moved and had his being," could not 

 fail to be interesting to his countrymen, who enjoy to so 

 great an extent the results of his talents, his skill, and his 

 industry ; and I have therefore thrown together the following 

 notes, to give an insight into the state of that art, and to 

 show with what success it has been followed in that one 

 district of our kingdom which has earned for itself the proud 

 title of "the Potteries." 



The early fictile history of the important district to which 

 I have referred, and which is universally known as the 

 " Staffordshire Potteries," is naturally, like that of every 

 place or seat of manufacture, involved in mystery. That 

 mystery, however, happily is not altogether impenetrable. 

 By the constant labours of the antiquary, and the discoveries 

 which from time to time he is enabled to make, a light is 

 every now and then thrown on the productions of the early 

 inhabitants of the place; and thus new links in the chain 

 which connects the present with the past are continually 



