There were three shapes of rummers used, one goblet shape, one on a
tall stem, and one on a stem which is also a base: sometimes the base
of an old rummer is square. The first of these three shapes has a
baluster stem, the second a plain round, spiral, or cut stem.
Fine mugs, with handles, imitating contemporary old silverware, are
found; the mugs show something of a stem (see illustration, page 7).
Often they are engraved with the initials of their first owner, and
sometimes are dated also. Fine double-handled mugs, like loving-cups,
exist.
[Illustration: (1) JOEY, (2) THISTLE FUDDLING, (3) BRISTOL COACHING,
AND (4) JOEY GLASSES]
5. SPIRIT GLASSES AND CORDIAL GLASSES
These are small in bowl and short in stem, the bowl is often
straight-sided, and the stem is usually drawn, and often cut. But there
are many with drawn bowls and plain stems. A “thistle” glass of this
kind is specially valued. Often the bowl is engraved. Cordial glasses
may have long stems.
6. COACHING GLASSES AND FUDDLING GLASSES
These are glasses which have no feet: they were used at one draught of
the liquor in them. I bought a Bristol opal glass of the kind for 6d.,
but these are excessively rare. Almost as rare are the plain glasses,
with cut stems, used in coaching days. When the stage coach paused at
an inn, a waiter came out with a tray of footless glasses, each resting
on its bowl; the traveller took one up, inverted it into the proper
position, held it out to the bottle or decanter in the waiter’s hand,
drank, and set the glass down upon its bowl again. A fuddling glass was
a variety of coaching glass used indoors, for a rapid dram; a “thistle”
glass of this kind was favoured in Scotland.
[Illustration: (1) DRAM, (2) TOASTMASTER, (3) OAKLEAF, AND (4) HOGARTH
GLASSES]
7. TOASTMASTER GLASSES
These are less capacious dram glasses than they seem; the lower part
of the bowl was deceptively made very thick, so that the toastmaster
at a banquet need not drink so much as would otherwise have been
necessary, when announcing and sharing in every one of the score or two
of the toasts and “sentiments” which were honoured at every convivial
board. A relic of the “sentiment” habit was preserved by Dickens in the
language of Mr. Dick Swiveller: “May the wing of friendship never moult
a feather” was a “sentiment” in its day.
8. “HOGARTH” GLASSES
Certain short, short-stemmed, or almost stemless glasses, with
“Norwich” feet often, and with drawn or waisted-bell bowls wide at the
mouth, are known as “Hogarth” glasses, because they were often shown in
Hogarth’s pictures of contemporary social life.
9. TAVERN AND KITCHEN GLASSES
Old glasses are often found which in shape and purpose correspond with
those described in this chapter and chapters vi, vii, and viii, but
were obviously inferior in finish of make when new. These may be taken
to be glasses made cheaply for tavern and kitchen use; though not so
attractive as the better qualities, they should not be neglected by the
collector.
10. YARD OF ALE GLASSES
Evelyn tells in his diary that in 1683 the health of James II was drunk
at Bromley “in a flint glass of a yard long.” Imitations of these
are made, but the real old ones are excessively rare. In shape they
rather resemble a coaching-horn, the mouthpiece being the foot, or the
mouthpiece being replaced by a bulb. They were used at merry-makings,
as proof of bibulous skill in emptying a glass a yard long. There are
also half-yard glasses.
11. “THIMBLEFUL” GLASSES
These have a very small straight-sided or ogee bowl, upon a plain
round, or spiral stem and big foot. They are very rare.
X. JACOBITE, WILLIAMITE, AND HANOVERIAN GLASSES
These are the aristocracy among the wine glasses, goblets, and spirit
glasses. They are rare, difficult to find, and costly to buy, but not
impossible to come upon by lucky hazard.
THE ROSE GLASSES
[Illustration: JACOBITE GLASS SHOWING THE STUART ROSE: ALSO THE
“CENTRAL TUBE” IN THE STEM]
The dearest aim of every collector of old wine glasses is to come upon
a Jacobite glass. The more sanguine and less strict kind of collector
declares himself the owner of a Jacobite example if he possesses a
glass engraved with a six-petalled heraldic Stuart rose (one petal for
each King or Queen of Stuart blood who actually reigned in England, he
says), a large bud (representing the Old Pretender, he explains), a
smaller bud (for the Young Pretender), and a bird or (see illustration,
page 20) butterfly (crossing the narrow seas, he explains, to bring the
Stuarts back).
[Illustration: JACOBITE GLASS, SHOWING PORTRAIT OF THE YOUNG PRETENDER]
[Illustration: JACOBITE GLASS, SHOWING THE THISTLE]
A stricter, less easily satisfied collector points out that those were
“the ordinary rose glasses,” used at all fashionable dinner-tables
in the eighteenth century (see illustration, page 59). The reply to
that is that the six-petalled rose and one of the buds, at least, are
heraldic, not naturally represented; that the heraldic, six-petalled
white rose was the Stuart rose; and that, at any rate, the “ordinary
rose glasses” were sometimes used by Jacobites, particularly in general
assemblies, because of their covert meaning, when it would have been
unsafe to use the treasonable Jacobite glasses proper. A slight
addition to the rose glass makes it truly Jacobite; thus I own a fine
goblet which is made Jacobite by a monk’s-hood flower being added--a
reference to General Monk. An “ordinary rose glass”--not so ordinary
after all, and difficult to procure now, as well as dear to buy--which
has a Stuart emblem engraved _under_ the foot of it is allowed to pass
muster by the stricter collector, but what he aims at or boasts of if
he possesses one is a “Jacobite glass proper.”
THE “JACOBITE”
Now a “Jacobite glass proper” is engraved with a portrait of the Old
Pretender, or of his son “Bonnie Prince Charlie”; or with the rose,
two buds, a butterfly or a bird, and also a Jacobite motto or emblem,
or both; or with the cypher of the Old Pretender and the words of a
loyalist song. Upon a firing glass (the rarest of the Jacobite variety)
may be seen the touching emblem of a thunder-smitten tree putting forth
new branches, and the motto _Revirescit_ (It becomes green again).
Upon a wine glass may be seen the word “Fiat” with a star (perhaps
standing for _fiat lux_, “Let there be light,” or perhaps for “Let it
be done”--the second Restoration of the Stuarts). Or the motto may be
_Redeat_ (let him return), or, very rare, _Redi_; or _Radiat_ (perhaps
a misspelling of _Redeat_, or possibly meant for “let him shine”). If
an oak-leaf (as well as the other features) appear on the glass, it was
probably used in England; if a thistle, probably in Scotland.
[Illustration: JACOBITE “FIRING” GLASS, SHOWING THE OAKLEAF AND THE
WORD “FIAT”]
There still are a few Jacobite glasses lying unrecognised no doubt;
two were found in a London broker’s shop a few years ago, and bought
for 5s.; in 1914 a Bristol schoolmaster learned accidentally that two
glasses which had stood on a shelf on a sideboard in the family for
forty years were _Fiat_ glasses, and a valuer going to a house in
Sussex for other purposes, discovered a Prince Charlie portrait glass
(worth a hundred guineas now) still passing _incognito_--there had been
“the pair of it,” but that had been “smashed to bits,” the servants
said.
[Illustration: JACOBITE “FIRING” GLASS, SHOWING THE STAR AND THE
ROSEBUD]
The rarest form of Jacobite glasses is the short toasting or firing
glass, for strong waters, of “Hogarth” shape. I possess one of these;
it has a “Norwich” foot; the thickness of the base of the bowl, and
the “tear” in that and the short bulbous stem, seem to date it at
about 1725, so that it will be an “Old Pretender” glass. It is very
beautifully engraved with the six-petalled rose, the two buds, the word
“Fiat,” the rising star and the (Boscobel) oak-leaf. It had been kept
in an armoury, belonging to a collector who did not collect old glass.
[Illustration: JACOBITE FIRING-GLASS: NOTE THE TERRACED OR “NORWICH”
FOOT AND THE “TEAR” IN THE BALUSTER STEM: ALSO THE CENTRE OF THE ROSE,
BRIGHT AMIDST THE GROUND-GLASS PETALS]
No wonder people hunt for Jacobite glasses. They were the romantic,
loyal, treasonable vessels which were emptied to the toast of “his
Majesty over the water,” in clandestine and dangerous gatherings of
fair women and conspiring men. Then the great punch-bowl was filled
with water, to represent the narrow seas, and the red wine sparkled in
the glasses held out above it; as often at loyal Georgian assemblies a
Jacobite would be seen to hold his wine glass above a tumbler of water,
if called on to drink to “the King”:
_Then all leapt up and joined their hands
With hearty clasp and greeting,
The brimming cups, outstretched by all,
Over the wide bowl meeting:
“A health!” they cried, “to witching eyes
Of sweetheart, wife, or daughter,
But never forget the white, white rose,
That blooms for us over the water!”_
Flip these old glasses with the finger-nail, and they ring like a
tuning-fork; draw thumb and finger upwards to the edge of the bowl, and
you hear a clear faint resonance, sad as the wailings after Culloden,
when final defeat had come.
THE “WILLIAMITE”
I bought two fine, perfect, baluster-stemmed Williamite glasses for
a guinea once; they show William of Orange on horseback, and are
inscribed with “The Glorious Memory of King William, No Surrender,
Boyne, 1st. Iuly 1690”; and the initials “T.C” and “S.C”; on some such
glasses two of the initials are “S.T.” (see illustration, page 47).
The glass is a yellowish-white where it is thick, and if not made at
Belfast, may have been made in Cork; but the engraving would be done
in Ulster. Some such glasses are rather recent; no doubt the making of
Williamite glasses continued longer than the making of Jacobite glasses
did, because of the continued existence of Orange Lodges. Some of these
glasses are inscribed “The Immortal Memory” only, or “To the glorious
memory of King William” only. Williamite firing glasses, of “Hogarth”
shape, are also found.
THE “HANOVERIAN”
When the House of Hanover came to the throne of the United Kingdom,
loyal drinking glasses were made accordingly. “God save King George”
and “Liberty” are the usual inscriptions on them; sometimes the
heraldic white horse of Hanover was engraved on the bowl, or the three
crosses of the Union Jack inside a garter and the rays of the sun.
Hanoverian glasses are rarer than Jacobite or Williamite, but Jacobite
glasses are the most valued and costly.
XI. TUMBLERS, TANKARDS, “JOEYS,” AND “BOOT” GLASSES
I class these together because they are stemless. Pewter and silver
tankards were imitated in glass, and these differ from mugs in being
straight-sided and quite stemless; often they were engraved with
initials and dates.
Old tumblers are not found so numerously as old wine glasses are;
they are usually large, are often cut, and are sometimes engraved.
Some tumblers are barrel-shaped, like some rummers, but most tumblers
are “straight-sided” or “rectangular.” Some tumblers are engraved
with portraits (as of Admiral Keppel) or with inscriptions (as of
“Wellington for ever”). I own two which celebrate the “Independence of
Durham and Richd. Wharton its defender,” probably made at Sunderland in
1802, to commemorate a Parliamentary Election in which the freedom of
the citizens of Durham from rule by the bishop’s bailiff was involved.
Masonic tumblers are rare; so are Bristol opal-glass tumblers, yet I
own one which cost me 1s.
“Joeys” are dram glasses, shaped like tumblers, or like fuddling
glasses with no foot or stem (see illustration, page 62). Mr. Joseph
Hume, M.P., had caused fourpenny bits to be coined; fourpenny bits
were accordingly called “joeys”; even to-day people call for a “joey”
of brandy. When a tax was put on gin, less of the liquor could then
be sold for fourpence; so that the glass was made thicker, and the
contents accordingly less. For a similar reason to-day there are in
public-houses glasses called “Lloyd Georges,” I am told. The two
“joeys” I own are of grass-green hue; one is inscribed with “4d.”
[Illustration: SMALL BOOT GLASSES]
“Boot” glasses are small blown vessels in the shape of riding-boots,
probably used for spirits in the parting dram, otherwise called the
stirrup-cup. There seems little foundation for the suggestion that
these were emblems of Lord Bute, in the days of George III; for as Mr.
Hartshorne, the founder of glass-collecting, discovered, a jack-boot
glass is preserved in the museum of Liège and another in a Dutch
museum, and these are older and more elaborate than the English “boot”
glasses. I own two of those which Mr. Hartshorne collected, and on
which he based the “Bute” suggestion, but small “boot” glasses are
exceedingly rare. A big one, cut, and 12 inches high, was once offered
me; I think it came from Liège. Large boot glasses striped with white
are seen sometimes; “boot” glasses can hardly have been peculiar to
Great Britain. Perhaps they were used by hunting men as an emblem of
their sport.
XII. BOTTLES, DECANTERS, AND JUGS
BOTTLES
The Trapnell collection contained an early seventeenth-century bottle,
with a seal of a king’s head; another dated Henry Galshell, 1700;
another inscribed T. Bellamy, 1773. I own one bearing “C. Yoxall, 1778”
in raised letters on a raised lozenge. These are all of dark, thick
glass, and are short-necked and tun-bellied. A little later, in 1786,
for instance, the shape became like that of a beer bottle to-day, but
larger.
The rectangular, shouldered spirit bottles, with separately made short
necks, and engraved or gilded, are usually Dutch, and were perhaps
enclosed in cases, something like “tantalus” bottles. There are tall,
embossed spirit bottles, often of coloured glass, with cut-glass
stoppers. There are cut-glass English bottles, decanter-shaped but
stopperless, a cork being used. Holster bottles were a kind of flask
carried in the saddle holster. Bottles for oil and vinegar and spices
resembled cruet bottles as a rule. Scent bottles, large, in plain
glass, are found; small scent bottles, cut or coloured, or mounted with
silver or pinchbeck stoppers, exist in great numbers; I own a Bristol
scent bottle which is cut like a shell cameo, through two layers of
coloured glass, one pink, one opal, down to the basal layer of plain
glass; it cost me 6s. 6d.
DECANTERS
During most of the eighteenth century wine came to table in bottles;
“decanting” began to be the fashion about 1780, perhaps. The decanters
of that date have sloping shoulders as a rule; some in shape resemble
a drawn glass with short stem reversed; a little later decanters
became more globular and high-shouldered, with shorter necks. Engraved
festoons on a decanter, as indeed upon a wine glass, usually indicate
the “Empire” period by their decoration--the end of the eighteenth
century, if not the beginning of the next. It must be said, however,
that some “Jacobite” decanters exist with long necks and globular
bodies; so difficult is it to find a rule without an exception in old
glass. These Jacobite decanters have pointed stoppers, too; whereas
oval rounded stoppers seem generally to have been the early form.
JUGS
Ale jugs, wine jugs, and water jugs in plain, coloured, or cut glass
are plentiful. The most desirable are Waterford made, known by
the tint, the weight, and the cutting. Cork-made jugs, resembling
Waterford-made in cutting, but yellowish in tint, are found. Bristol
coloured jugs, Wrockwardine striped and Nailsea splashed glass jugs
exist; these, like many other old plain glass jugs, are blown and not
cut. Jugs with very large necks and lips, either blown or cut, are
fairly early examples. Sometimes a plain glass jug will have a raised
festoon of plain or coloured glass about its neck.
Milk and cream jugs in Bristol blue, opal, or ruby glass are well
known; cut milk-jugs exist in fair number.
XIII. BOWLS, LIFTERS, SUGAR-CRUSHERS, SPOONS, ETC.
Large cut-glass bowls, and plain bowls, exist, perhaps too small for
punch (except the Bristol painted opal-glass ones), but big enough for
fruit or salads. Often these stand on feet and stems. Finger bowls
of plain blown and of cut glass are found. Coloured glass bowls, of
Bristol blue, green, violet, or red, are desirable acquisitions. The
earliest form of finger bowl was not a finger glass so much as a wine
cooler or glass rinser; these have two projecting lips or ears opposite
each other, to support the glass as it lay in the water rinsing or
cooling.
[Illustration: COLLARLESS, CUT, AND COLLARED “LIFTERS”: THE MIDDLE
COLLAR REPRESENTS A “FILLET”]
The _toddy lifter_, _punch lifter_, or _grog lifter_ is an interesting
glass article; I own seven, though examples are quite rare. There are
several shapes. When the lower part is a high-shouldered decanter shape
it is said to be a punch lifter, and English; when the lower part is
round and shoulderless, like a club, it is Scottish and a toddy lifter.
In most cases there is a fillet or collar of glass round the neck, and
these are called ring-necked; the absence of the ring is rare. The
bowl is of the size required for an ordinary glassful, for the lifters
were used to transfer punch, toddy, or grog from the punch-bowl to the
glass. The earlier way of doing this was by a silver or wooden ladle,
but about the year 1800 the glass lifter (which is really a pipette or
siphon) came into use. When the base of the lifter sank into the punch,
the punch rose into the bowl of it by a hole in the bottom of it; the
thumb then closed the hole at the top of the neck, thus creating a
vacuum. Then the lifter could be carried over the table to the glass,
and when the thumb was taken away the punch ran down into the glass.
Glass sugar crushers, plain, cut, or ridged with spirals, are found,
with a pestle-like end to them. Glass spoons are rare. Glass knives
are found, but most of them are doubtful. Pestles of Nailsea glass are
seen, perhaps once used by ladies in their still-rooms; maybe glass
mortars to match them may turn up.
Knife rests for the table are found, some plain moulded, some cut, some
even with spirals inside them.
XIV. CANDLESTICKS, LUSTRES, AND LAMPS
Lustres and girandoles are often collected; glass standard lamps
seldom, at present; glass candlesticks are much hunted for.
1. CANDLESTICKS
The most beautiful of glass candlesticks are those made and cut at
Waterford, which stand about 12 inches high; £10 is a low price for
a pair. Bristol cut-glass candlesticks are nearly as fine; Bristol
opal-glass candlesticks, plain or painted in the Battersea enamel
style, are exceedingly rare. Candlesticks with air-spiral and
cotton-white stems are occasionally met with. Ordinary moulded-glass
candlesticks, of the early nineteenth century, are pretty numerous:
fine moulded candlesticks are of earlier date.
[Illustration: FINE MOULDED CANDLESTICKS; SEE ALSO ILLUSTRATION, PAGE
60]
Glass candlesticks of Georgian date follow much the same order as
the contemporary wine glasses, in the feet, pontil-marks, and stems.
The earliest have baluster stems about 9 inches high, and round feet
between 6 and 7 inches in diameter; the feet are domed or high instep,
and the pontil-mark is a lump. The dome foot occurs with the air-spiral
stems, later, and even with the cut stems, later still; in these last,
as in the moulded and in the cut and engraved examples, the pontil-mark
does not show. Fine candlesticks ornamented by purfling were made (see
illustration, page 60). Glass taper stands are found.
2. LUSTRES
The degenerate form of lustre that was found on every parlour
mantelpiece about the year 1860 is the best-known form, and many of
these coloured glass objects, belling out at the top and bottom, with
hanging prisms fantastically cut, are still extant; but as yet they are
little collected. The name “lustres,” however, may be used to include
the standing girandoles and the hanging chandeliers adorned with
festoons of diamond-like cut prisms, and these are much sought after;
many collectors acquire loose prisms, long or diamond-shaped, whenever
they can, and have them re-strung, to be added to new glass chandeliers.
The earliest form of the girandole, or standing lustre, had a glass
standard and glass arms; the top of the standard was a candlestick
nozzle; the glass standard and arms and the dependent prisms reflected
the candlelight brilliantly. Two of these were in use at Mount Vernon
when George Washington was President of the United States; in the
_Boston News Letter_ for 1719, “Fine Glass Lamps and Lanthorns” were
advertised. Later, French influence brought in the ormolu and brass
standards, some two feet high with ormolu arms and glass hangers.
A complete set of girandoles, for a mantelpiece or console-stand,
consisted of three, with ormolu bases (sometimes representing a human
figure), standards, and arms; the central one triply or quintuply a
candlestick, the side ones singly so.
In the fine tall lustres made in pairs at Cork about 1820 all was
glass, except the metal clips inserted in the nozzles to hold the
candles better. Until lustres lost their meaning and became mere mantel
ornaments the candlestick part of them was a usual feature.
3. LAMPS
Glass standard lamps, some with round bases, some with square bases,
the stems cut or balustered, may be found; in some cases the standard
is short and supports a blown-glass lampshade; in other cases a
blown-glass bulb is part of the tall standard.
A rare and interesting form of lamp, one of the oldest, has a bulb
with an opening in the top, the edges of the opening rounded off, and
a corrugated stand; these are small, and were used for nightlights. I
own three, one of them with a handle, and a dish beneath it, evidently
used for carrying the light from room to room (see illustration, page
27); such as these would, perhaps, be the old “mortars,” or night-light
holders, for a cake of wax and a wick.
XV. COMPORTS, SWEETMEAT, JELLY AND CUSTARD GLASSES
COMPORTS
[Illustration: COMPORT, WITH CAPTAIN GLASS AND SWEETMEAT GLASS; ALL
THREE SHOWING THE “INVERTED OBELISK” STEM]
A comport is a large glass stand upon which (as the name signifies)
other things may be carried together. A comport consists of a large
or largish glass disc, flat, with a rim to it, upheld upon a thick
stem--most often a shouldered stem, in shape resembling an inverted
obelisk, rising from a domed and folded foot. An old comport is a rare
possession; a modern glass cake-stand, such as confectioners use, is
a near approach to it in shape. The use of a comport appears to have
been to stand on a dining-table, bearing a number of glasses filled
with jelly or sweetmeats.
SWEETMEAT GLASSES
Old sweetmeat glasses were used at table much as bon-bon dishes are
now, to pass round at the dessert course; or to hand to ladies at other
than mealtimes, during a call. Sweetmeat glasses proper resemble wine
glasses, but have wide bowls, thick-lipped, unsuitable for drinking
from: the shape of the stem resembled that of the stem of the comport.
Often these glasses were engraved.
[Illustration: SWEETMEAT GLASSES: (1) MOULDED; (2) ENGRAVED (3)
WATERFORD CUT]
“CAPTAIN” OR “MASTER” GLASSES
In the centre of the comport, surrounded by sweetmeat glasses, a
bigger, taller “captain” or “master” glass stood; its shape resembled
that of the smaller glasses, and it probably held a store from which
these could be replenished. “Captain” glasses are much sought for; the
most valuable are Waterford cut, the West-End price for one being now
£8.
[Illustration: JELLY GLASSES. NOTE THE MOULDED ORNAMENT]
The bowls are usually varieties of the double ogee; the moulded stem is
usually high-shouldered, inverted obelisk in shape, but air-spiral and
cotton-white spiral stems are found (see illustration, page 1). A cut
stem is usually knopped, but may be plain round, except for the cutting.
JELLY GLASSES