39 
D e c ember, 1915 
Two English glass rummers engraved with Nelson subjects and a smaller Jacobite Arms 
rummer. Collection of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences 
as early as 1680, and 
popular till 1730) ; the 
plain stem (most fre¬ 
quently met with in 
glasses from 1700 to 
1750); the air - twist 
stem (in vogue from 
1725 to 1775, and per¬ 
haps later) ; the opaque 
white twist stem (1745 
till the end of the cen¬ 
tury) ; the a i r and 
opaque white twist 
stem, the color twist 
stem and the cut stem 
(from about the mid¬ 
dle of the 18th Cen¬ 
tury). The first two 
glasses of the three 
shown in the fourth il¬ 
lustration are examples 
of baluster stems. A 
glass with a plain stem 
is shown in the glass 
to the extreme right of 
the first illustration, 
while the first three glasses of this same 
plate are types of the air twist stem. The 
air-bubble imprisoned in the stem of the 
Williamite glass, shown at the right of the 
fourth illustration, gives to this type of glass 
the name of tear-glass. Almost without 
exception these “tears” have the point of 
the “tear” downward, although I have 
heard that a glass showing the reverse of 
this order is or was in the private collec¬ 
tion of Sir James Yoxall, a noted English 
collector. 
The air twist stems are an evolution of 
the “tears.” The glass containing air-bub¬ 
bles came to be heated and drawn out and 
ingeniously manipulated in such a way as 
to produce the effect of twisted filaments 
which produced such patterns within the 
glass as one sees in the first illus¬ 
tration. Before manipulation, the bub¬ 
bles were produced artificially by prick¬ 
ing into the glass, softened by heat and 
covered over, in turn, with a film of molten 
glass. 
The opaque white twist stem — the color 
twist stem also — was obtained after the 
Venetian fashion of 
making millefiori glass, 
as derived from the 
Roman glass of an¬ 
tiquity. The process 
consisted of joining 
thin rods of opaque 
white glass interspersed 
with rods of clear crys¬ 
tal glass, carefully and 
systematically 
arranged, and of pour¬ 
ing molten clear glass 
around them, after they 
had been heated and 
placed in a mold. The 
whole was then with¬ 
drawn and reheated 
and the mass drawn 
out and twisted in such 
a manner that the white 
glass formed filaments 
and the stems in conse¬ 
quence resembled 
those produced by the 
air twist process above 
referred to. Rare spe¬ 
cimens of stems are 
found with delicate 
tints of blue and red among the filaments. 
All these twist and tear stems are now¬ 
adays reproduced and occasionally fraud¬ 
ulently offered as genuine to the unwary. 
But such glass neither rings true nor is 
right in color, though the copyists are com¬ 
ing to display their skill in the matter of 
tint likewise, even though balked by spe¬ 
cific gravity. A number of the cut stem 
glasses were coaching glasses—that is, 
glasses without feet, which stood inverted 
on the tray when brought to the coach 
traveller at a relay-inn. After his hasty 
drink the traveler would replace the glass 
inverted, hence there was no need for the 
foot, and less likelihood of a tray of such 
glasses, hurriedly carried, coming to grief 
through carelessness. With the advent of 
railroads and the decline of coaching such 
glasses were retired from service. Many 
of these old-time coaching glasses were en¬ 
graved and inscribed, though few of them 
have survived and a specimen would, in¬ 
deed, be a piece de resistance in any col¬ 
lection of glass. 
We see from these notes that there is 
less guesswork con¬ 
nected with the study 
and collecting of old 
glass than one, unini¬ 
tiated in the rudiments 
of its lore, might, per¬ 
haps, suppose. Noth¬ 
ing is without a rea¬ 
son ; the thing is to find 
that raison-d’ctre — that 
is the true collector's 
pleasure. 
Of all the engraved 
or of the inscribed 
English glass none is 
more interesting in its 
historical connection 
than the Jacobite 
drinking-glasses. Their 
story, briefly, is this: 
After the flight of 
James II left William 
of Orange firmly in 
possession of the gov¬ 
ernment, an act of Par¬ 
liament, 1701, formally 
excluded the house of Stuart from the 
throne, and settled the succession (after 
William and his sister-in-law, Anne, should 
have died) upon the house of Hanover. 
Prince Charles James Edward, Chevalier 
of St. George (the son of James II), was 
recognized by Louis XIV of 1 ranee as 
rightful King of England. This led Will¬ 
iam to prepare to make war on France, 
when death overtook him, and Anne be¬ 
came Queen of England. Queen Anne, 
thanks to Marlborough,_ successfully car¬ 
ried out William’s policies, and every at¬ 
tempt of the Stuarts to regain the throne 
was frustrated. Anne died in 1714, but as 
early as 1710 the Cycle, a famous and fac¬ 
tious Jacobite club, was formed, an example 
followed throughout England and Scotland. 
The Jacobites were, of course, those who 
sought to restore the house of Stuart, a 
dangerous treason from the Crown’s point 
of view, and those Jacobites who had any 
desire to keep their heads on their shoul¬ 
ders had to proceed with care and secrecy. 
Nevertheless, even after the rebellion of 
1715 and the famous “disappointment” of 
1 7 4 5, the Jacobites, 
when toasting the 
King, would hold their 
drinking-glasses above 
a bowl of water to sig¬ 
nify that they drank to 
“the King over the wa¬ 
ter,” the Old Pretender 
or, after his death, to 
the Young Pretender. 
The bolder Jacobites 
had their drinking- 
glasses engraved with 
Stuart emblems — an 
heraldic rose and two 
buds were, for in¬ 
stance, emblematic of 
James II, his son and 
his grandson, while a 
star, oak - leaves and 
acorns, etc., were ob¬ 
vious in allusion. The 
very boldest Jacobites 
had glasses inscribed 
with mottoes — Fiat be¬ 
ing the most general 
one, as this “Let it be 
(Continued on 
page 56.) 
Three rare Williamite glasses. Collection of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences 
