William Hone, in his "Day-Book" for 1831, says, "This superb glass
vase, designed by John Gunby, and exhibited at the Queen's Bazaar,
Oxford Street, London, is an immense basin of copper, and its iron
shaft or foot clothed with two thousand four hundred pieces of glass,
construct a vase fourteen feet high and twelve feet wide across the
brim, weighing upwards of eight tons, and capable of holding eight
pipes of wine. Each piece of glass is richly cut with mathematical
precision and beautifully colored; the colors are gold, ruby, emerald,
&c.; the colored pieces being cemented upon the metal body and rendered
air-tight. The exterior is a gem-like surface of inconceivable
splendor; on a summer afternoon it forms a mass of brilliancy. The
vase, by illumination of gas alone, glittered like diamonds upon melted
gold. Mr. Reingale says the human mind, in all of its extensive range
of thought, is not able to conceive a splendid glass vase cut in a more
elaborate and novel way. At the first sight one is confounded with
astonishment, and knows not whether what we see is real, or whether on
a sudden we have not been transported to another globe. To England is
due the honor of its production, and it comes from the hands of one of
its numerous celebrated artists, Mr. Gunby. The precious metal, gold,
glitters in all its glory, intermixed, or rather united with
extraordinary beauty of cutting and rich and splendid enamelled
painting. One is at a loss whether most to admire the shape, the
gorgeous brilliancy, the sparkle of the gems, the beauty of the
cutting, the enamelling, the general conception, or the immense bulk of
this magnificent and astounding work of art."
The "Scientific American" states, "The troupe of glass-blowers at Hope
Chapel furnish a very interesting evening's entertainment for those who
are fond of practical things. A steam-engine, most beautifully
constructed of different colored glass, is worked by steam all the
time. The nature of the material affords an opportunity to see all the
several parts moving at once, and it is really a very curious sight,
even to an engineer, and one that will well repay a visit."
Among the numerous specimens of ancient glass now in the British
Museum, there are enough of the Egyptian and Roman manufacture to
impress us with profound respect for the art as pursued by the earlier
workers in glass. Among them is a fragment considered as the _ne plus
ultra_ of the chemical and manipulatory skill of the ancient workers.
It is described as consisting of no less than five layers or strata of
glass, the interior layer being of the usual blue color, with green and
red coatings, and each strata separated from and contrasted with the
others by layers of white enamel, skilfully arranged by some eminent
artist of the Grecian school. The subject is a female reposing upon a
couch, executed in the highest style of art. It presents a fine
specimen of gem engraving. Among the articles made of common material
are a few green vases about fifteen inches high, in an excellent state
of preservation, and beautiful specimens of workmanship. In the
formation of the double handles and curves, these vases evince a degree
of skill unattained by the glass-blowers of the present period.
The cases in the Egyptian room at the Museum contain several necklaces,
small figures, scarab├Ži, and other objects, which would appear to an
ordinary observer to be composed of precious stones. They are, in fact,
at least most of them, formed either of glass throughout the whole
substance, or of materials covered with a glass coating. The
manufacture of articles of this description presupposes a market for
them; and the desire upon the part of the less affluent members of
society to possess, at a cheap rate, ornaments in imitation of their
superiors, necessarily leads to the conclusion that, even at the most
ancient of the periods I have mentioned, the Egyptians had made a
remarkable advance in the customs of civilized life. The Museum cases
also exhibit networks of glass bugles, with which the wrappers of
mummies were often decorated; and there is abundance of evidence to
show that wine was frequently served at table in glass bottles and
cups. Alexander the Great is said to have been buried at Alexandria in
a coffin composed wholly of glass.
The specimens taken from the tombs at Thebes are also numerous. Their
rich and varied colors are proofs of the chemical and inventive skill
of the ancients. These specimens embrace not only rich gems and mosaic
work, but also fine examples of the lachrymatory vase. Some of the
vases are made from common materials, with very great skill and taste.
The specimen of glass coin, with hieroglyphical characters, must not be
omitted; as also a miniature effigy of the Egyptian idol "Isis"; a
specimen of which proves that the Egyptians must have been acquainted
with the art of _pressing_ hot glass into metallic moulds, an art
which has been considered of modern invention. English glass-makers
considered the patent pillar glass a modern invention until a Roman
vase was found (it is now to be seen in the Polytechnic Institution in
London), being a complete specimen of pillar moulding. Pillat states in
his work that he had seen an ancient drinking vessel of a Medrecan
form, on a foot of considerable substance, nearly entire, and procured
from Rome, which had the appearance of having been blown in an
open-and-shut mould, the rim being afterwards cut off and polished.
This is high authority, and, with other evidences that might be cited,
goes far to prove that the ancients used moulds for pressing, and also
for blowing moulded articles, similar to those now in use.
Pompeian window-glass, of which panes have been discovered as large as
twenty by twenty-eight inches, has proved, on examination, to have been
cast in a manner similar to that now followed in making plate-glass,
except that it was not rolled flat, as now, by metal cylinders, but
pressed out with a wooden mallet, so that its thickness is not uniform.
A glass has been discovered at Pompeii, about the size of a crown
piece, with a convexity, which leads one to suppose it to be a
magnifying lens. Now, it has been said that the ancients were not aware
of this power, and the invention is given to Galileo by some, to a
Dutchman, in 1621, by others, while a compound microscope is attributed
to one Fontana, in the seventeenth century. But without a magnifying
glass, how did the Greeks and Romans work those fine gems which the
human eye is unable to read without the assistance of a glass? There is
one in the Naples Royal Collection, for example, the legend of which it
is impossible to make out, unless by applying a magnifying power. The
glass in question, with a stone ready cut and polished for engraving,
are now to be seen in the Museum of Naples.
Specimens of colored glass, pressed in beautiful forms for brooches,
rings, beads, and similar ornaments, are numerous. Of those of Roman
production many specimens have been found in England. Some of these
were taken from the Roman barrows. In Wales glass rings have been
found; they were vulgarly called "snake stones," from the popular
notion that they were produced by snakes, but were in fact rings used
by the Druids as a charm with which to impose upon the superstitious.
We find, too, that the specific gravity of the specimens referred to
ranges from 2034 to 3400, proving oxide of lead to have been used in
their manufacture; the mean gravity of modern flint-glass being 3200.
From what we gather from the foregoing facts, we are inclined to the
belief that, in fine fancy work, in colors, and in the imitation of
gems, the ancient glass-makers excelled the modern ones. They were also
acquainted with the art of making and using moulds for blown and
pressed glass, and forming what in England is now called patent pillar
glass. All these operations, however, were evidently on a very limited
scale, their views being mainly directed to the production of small but
costly articles. Although in the time of the Roman manufacturers vases
of extra size were made, requiring larger crucibles and furnaces than
those used by the glass-makers of Tyre, yet it is evident that they
produced few articles except such as were held sacred for sepulchral
purposes, or designed for luxury. And while they possessed the
knowledge of the use of moulds to press and blow glass by expansion, it
does not appear that they produced any articles for domestic use. If it
were not thus, some evidences would be found among the various
specimens which have been preserved.