January, 1907 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



25 



dishes and also on small platters. The Arms of Virginia 

 appear on a vegetable dish and cover, also on a washbowl 

 and pitcher. I think no one has ever found the Arms of 

 New Hampshire on a piece of dark blue ware and yet it is 

 hardly probable that the maker of this set overlooked it. 

 He was making pottery to sell in the American market and 

 was decorating it with designs which he thought would be 

 popular in the States. Why, then, should he have slighted 

 one State when there were only thirteen? Possibly he was 

 superstitious ! That he knew there were thirteen States is 

 attested by the fact that the blue mark stamped on the back 

 of this ware has for a background thirteen stars and the 



includes many rare subjects. She has probably the best 

 known specimen of a Pennsylvania Arms platter. It is per- 

 fect in every particular and is what collectors call a "proof" 

 piece. She has a ten-inch soup plate, "Church and Buildings 

 in Murray Street"; a six-inch "St Paul's Chapel," New 

 York, with a medallion portrait on it and the rare little 

 six-inch "Harvard College" plate. Many other equaljy 

 choice pieces in this collection I would like to mention but 

 space will not permit. 



Mr. R. T. H. Halsey's collection of American Views on 

 dark blue Staffordshire is well known. Nearly every one 

 who is interested in this kind of pottery has read Mr. Hal- 



Part of the Collection of Mr.^Eugene Tompkins, Boston, Massachusetts. A Good Example of Artistic Grouping 



motto "E Pluribus Unum." This seems to contradict the 

 supposition that he might have been superstitious about the 

 number thirteen. My theory is that this piece exists some- 

 where and will eventually be found. It may have decorated 

 some uncommon or easily broken piece of the set, such, for 

 example, as the ladle of a tureen. This set of twelve Arms 

 pieces is the most difficult part of a collection to complete. 

 Eight of them, well known to all collectors, are extremely 

 rare. I do not know of any collector who has more than 

 eleven. 



Mrs. F. W. Yates, of Rochester, is well known as the 

 owner of a fine collection of blue china and as a frequent 

 contributor to the columns of the "Old China Magazine" dur- 

 ing the life of that periodical. Her collection of 216 pieces 



sey's book and knows that the majority of illustrations in 

 that excellent work are taken from pieces in his own col- 

 lection. 



The collection of Mrs. James B. Neal, of Easton, Pa., is 

 remarkable, not so much for its numerical strength, as for 

 the number of unique pieces which it contains. The twelve 

 and one-half-inch platter, "View near Catskill on the Hud- 

 son River," by W. G. Wall, Esq., is one of the gems of 

 this collection. So also is the fifteen-inch platter, "Junction 

 of the Hudson River and the Sacondaga," and the nineteen- 

 inch "Esplanade and Castle Garden" platter. The usual 

 size of an "Esplanade and Castle Garden" is seventeen 

 inches. This is the only one I know of which measures 

 nineteen inches. Mrs. Neal has a "Dutch Church at Al- 



