DICK AND HIS FRIENDS: Dick’s Pottery and how he made it

WHILE they were reading about Gofa making the pots, Dick thought he would like to try his hand at this sort of work; so, after the reading, when they went out, he got a trug and a trowel from the tool-shed and said that he should go and look for some clay.

“David and I are going fishing,” said Joe; “and when we have caught some fish, we are going to make a fire up at the hut and cook them. If you were a hunter, you would come too; making pottery is women’s work.”

“All right,” said Dick; “but if ever you were to be wrecked on a desert island, you might have to do women’s work, as you call it.”

However, Joe and David got their fishing rods and set off. Dick went down to the river too, but he could not find clay anywhere; so he came back and asked the gardener. The gardener said that a farmer was having a field drained close by, and the men were digging out lots of clay. So Dick went down to the field and filled his trug with clay, and then he made another journey to the river for fine sand. However, he did not find it easy to mix up the clay properly; for it was lumpy and hard, and when he put water to it, it was sticky. But, after a time, he got some mixed with the sand into a stiff paste, and then he was ready to try his hand at making a pot. He made several attempts at shaping the clay into a cup and tried to mould up the sides, using a flat stick and a smooth little stone that he had picked up by the river. But he did not succeed very well, as the clay was apt to break or get out of shape, and several times he squeezed it all up and began again. At last he contented himself with making quite a small cup which he could mould into shape with his fingers, pinching it and trimming it very carefully with his wooden tool. This one seemed good; so he made another a little larger, and then set them aside while he made a fire.

He collected a quantity of chips and sticks, and soon had a bright fire burning. After it had burned for about twenty minutes and made some hot ashes, Dick pushed the fire to one side, and set the cups upside down on the hot place. It was not easy to build up the fire again, because it had fallen away and was nearly out; and when he put on fresh fuel, the smoke got in his eyes. Also he poked his best cup with a big stick that he was putting on the fire, and dented its side; but it was too late to mend that, and he went on stoking up. He kept the fire going till he thought the pots must have become red hot among the ashes, and then he let it die down. He wondered whether he might try to get the cups out before they were cool; but he decided that it was best to leave them until the whole thing had cooled down. Just then, Joe and David came back, without any fish, and when they had heard what Dick had been doing, and had seen the fire, they all went in to tea.

When they came out after tea, they found the ashes still quite hot; but they got a garden rake and raked them off, and there were the two cups baked light brown and quite hard. The one that had been damaged was also much cracked; but the other one was sound except for one little crack, though it was not very shapely. Dick took it off to show to Uncle John.

“That’s a good one,” said Uncle John, “but if you had let them dry longer before putting them into the fire, they wouldn’t have cracked; and then you have forgotten something: what is it?”

Dick looked at his cup, but he could not tell what it was that he had forgotten.

“Why, the ornament,” said Uncle John. “When we pay that visit to the British Museum, you will see that the pottery of the old time always had ornament on it—or very nearly always. And I suppose you found it hard to make a bigger one? I daresay anybody would until he had had a great deal of practice. Even the old people that we have been reading about, who were so clever at making pots, had to build up their big ones on a wicker frame.

“There is something very interesting about the wicker-work frames, and you ought to remember it. It is this—baskets were made before pottery. In the very early days, before people could make pottery at all, they had, at any rate, rude sorts of baskets. And, I daresay, they sometimes tried to warm their food in baskets beside the fire. No doubt the baskets often caught fire and the food was spoiled. Then some woman who had her wits about her thought of daubing the basket with clay to make it resist the fire. The next thing was to plaster the clay inside the basket instead of outside, and next to burn the wicker off altogether; and so, in course of time, they learned how to make vessels of clay without any framework at all, except for the very large ones.”

That evening they spent some time making their bows. David was making his out of the stem of an ash sapling that the gamekeeper had given him; but Joe had got a branch of real yew for his and was whittling it down with great care. Dick’s father had sent him a set from London—a bow made of hickory with a stout gut bowstring, half a dozen arrows, and a bracer to wear on his left wrist as a protection from the string when shooting. It was very useful to have these to copy from; but Dick was not content to have only a ready-made bow, and he also got a good ash stick and set to work to make one for himself.