GLASS-MAKING. 23 



Tiffany. The idea is due to Mr. Tiffany, and suggested itself in 

 the most accidental manner. His own collection of glass included 

 several Venetian wine-glasses made of thin opalescent glass, as 

 well as several of thin transparent ruby of the quality used in 

 ordinary colored window glass. As a painter he was naturally 

 keenly alive to all color effects, and could not fail to be impressed 

 with the contrast presented by the two glasses. The opalescent 

 afforded such varying and beautiful effects, and seemed to possess 

 so many advantages over the ordinary transparent glass, that the 

 idea flashed upon him that if the ruby glass could be made use of 

 in windows, why could not the opalescent as well ? He decided at 

 any rate to attempt its introduction. After long and careful ex- 

 perimenting he succeeded in obtaining a sufficient quantity of 

 glass for the construction of a window. There were so many dif- 

 ficulties to be overcome, however, that for a time it seemed doubt- 

 ful whether the glass could ever be largely introduced. That 

 question has now been so far set at rest that the glass may be said 

 to enjoy too great a popularity for its own good. Its reputation 

 has been somewhat injured at the hands of enthusiastic glass-work- 

 ers — " glass sinners," Mr. Tiffany calls them — whose taste in this 

 direction appears to have suffered chromatic aberration. It is the 

 apparent ambition of these people to combine the greatest number 

 of colors in the smallest possible space, and the results have been 

 unhappy to such a degree as to frighten more sober-minded lovers 

 of beauty from paths so seemingly dangerous. This unfortunate 

 craze, however, may soon be expected to spend itself, and the 

 really artistic work in opalescent glass will suffer no permanent 

 damage from the nightmares in color which now disfigure many 

 even of our better-class tenements and hotels. 



But the glass-worker has only begun his work when he has 

 the molten " metal " simmering in his crucibles. It must undergo 

 many subsequent manipulations before it is available for the pur- 

 pose of art. Some of these, from a technical point of view, seem 

 retrogressional. It has been found that the rich color effects in 

 glass of the middle ages are largely due to the imperfections in 

 the material. Its lack of homogeneousness, its unequal thickness, 

 and uneven surfaces contribute largely to its beauty. The mod- 

 ern product is too uniform to be brilliant ; it transmits the light 

 with too great regularity. Intentional imperfections are, therefore, 

 introduced into the process ; and the products, in consequence, are 

 much more satisfactory to the artist. This work of individual- 

 izing the product has now been so far systematized that several 

 special brands of art glass are recognized in the markets. The so- 

 called antique glass, in both white and colors, is made precisely 

 like the ordinary sheet window glass, except that the surface of 

 the glass is made full of minute blow-holes, which produce almost 



