STAINED C4LASS AND CLASS USED FOR DECORATION. 93 



remain sufficiently vivid and brilliant without fatiguing the eye. Modern 

 amateurs and glass-painters have had their attention drawn to the fact, 

 that the agreeable blending and harmonising effect of ancient glass, 

 although occasionally due to surface decomposition, owes its chief charm 

 to the retention of the striae and small bubbles in the body of the glass. 

 The constituents of such glass have been perfectly vitrified, and the 

 colours fully developed, but being less transparent than when thoroughly 

 fined (like the ordinary clear coloured glass) becomes less dazzling and 

 more subdued. To succeed in making striated and bubbly-coloured 

 glass, having a horny or gelatinous appearance similar to the ancient, the 

 fining process must be arrested during the latter part of the fusion, by 

 reducing the heat of the metal to a sufficient consistency for working, 

 before the bubbles and striae are fully driven off : great attention is 

 necessary on the part of the manufacturer to reduce the temperature 

 of the furnace just at the right time to prevent the metal becoming too 

 clear. This imitation of the ancients constitutes the chief improvement 

 since 1851, as regards the vitrified material. 



Although these gelatinous striae and bubbles are quite apparent on 

 close inspection, they disappear when seen from a proper distance, a 

 portion of the light becoming absorbed, but retaining the full richness 

 of the colours. Pot -metal blues, greens, and rubies, &c, by this system 

 of embodying in the mass the hindrances to the too free passage of the 

 light, are far superior in effect to those of the ordinary, cheap, modern, 

 clear, bright-coloured glass. No person of taste should require the latter 

 which will fail to produce what is termed the peculiar " dim religious 

 light" of the ancients, resembling the reposing colours of the spectrum. 



Blue is often used as a background to groups or single figures, as 

 well as to the drapery and borders, and may therefore be considered the 

 prevailing colour ; and after this are ruby and green, all pot-metal 

 colours. 



About the year 1850, Messrs. PoWell and Son commenced manufac- 

 turing antique glass, of white and various pot-metal colours, a consider- 

 able portion of which, especially the blue and ruby, was equal to the 

 best specimens of ancient glass of the thirteenth century. This was 

 selected by Messrs. Ward and Hughes for the four windows painted by 

 them, and erected in the Temple Church, London, about the years 1853 

 and 1854. 



Messrs. Hartley, of Sunderland, and Messrs. Lloyd and Summerfield, 

 of Birmingham, have also produced antique glass. This glass is striated, 

 bubbly, and gelatinous, and sometimes the ruby is streaky. Pieces of 

 dark and light ruby are occasionally leaded separately, and placed side by 

 side, to give the effect of shading without the use of enamel colour. 

 A national debt of gratitude is due to Charles Winston, Esq., author of 

 a work on ' Ancient Glass Printing,' in two volumes, for his long, perse- 

 vering, and successful efforts to revive the rich colours and low tone of 

 ancient glass, the best specimens of which are to be seen in the four 

 windows of the Temple Church, painted at his suggestion and under 



