Vlll INTRODUCTION. 



It is in holding these views that I am enabled to say 

 the preparation of my present work has to me been " a 

 labour of love." Had its subject been less worthy than 

 it is, and had the actual toil been short of what it has 

 been, the pleasure I have felt * in its preparation and con- 

 tinuance would undoubtedly have been far less than that 

 I have experienced. How I have succeeded, it is for 

 others to judge. That my work may contain errors, I am 

 prepared to believe, and that it may not be so full and 

 complete as some may have desired, I can readily under- 

 stand ; but in future editions, should they be called for, I 

 hope to correct whatever there may be of the former, and 

 successfully to accomplish the latter. 



Mr. Gladstone, speaking of the subject of this memoir 

 in his admirable address on occasion of his laying the 

 foundation-stone of the " Wedgwood Memorial Institute," 

 at Burslem, said, " Surely it is strange that the life of such 

 a man should, in this ' nation of shopkeepers,' yet at this 

 date remain unwritten ; and I have heard with much plea- 

 sure a rumour, which 1 trust is true, that such a gap in 

 our literature is about to be filled up." That "gap" I have 

 endeavoured in this work to " fill up ; ' I hope with satis- 

 faction to my readers ; and I trust also that what I have 

 now for the first time brought together, maybe found useful, 

 and at the same time instructive, to collectors, while it may 

 be read with pleasure and profit by all. A large mass of 

 original letters of, and documents relating to, Josiah Wedg- 

 wood, are fortunately despite the wreck of the papers which 

 were with reprehensible thoughtlessness sold, destroyed, or 

 lost some years after his death preserved in the hands of 

 my friend, Mr. Joseph Mayer, F.S.A. These having been 

 unreservedly placed, years ago, by Mr. Mayer, in other hands, 



