THE TEAPOT, THE COFFEE-POT, THE TEA-KETTLE, THE TEA-CADDY

The silver plate of a country undoubtedly reflects the manners and customs of its users. The growth of luxury undoubtedly has had its influence upon the manufacture of a great number of silver articles employed in everyday use. But although the field be larger, the class of articles, to say nothing of the average artistic quality, differs in the same measure as the habits of the users. The antiquary of the twenty-first century who turns to the late nineteenth century will find marmalade-pots and pickle-forks in lieu of posset-pots and punch-ladles. He will find that cheap chemists have disseminated hair-brushes and cheap scent-bottles of inferior glass with silver rims.

The earliest known teapot is of the year 1670, although Pepys tells of drinking tea in 1660. This fine specimen is a lantern-shaped teapot with a history, and is illustrated page 243. It is inscribed, “This Silver tea Pott was presented to ye Com^ttee of ye East India Company by ye Right Hono^le George Lord Berkeley of Berkeley Castle. A member of that Honourable and worthy Society and A true Hearty Louer of them. 1670.” It is engraved with the arms of the donor and of the East India Company. The maker’s mark is T. L., and the date letter and hall-marks of London are of the year 1670.

In the year 1690 the form of teapot was melon-shaped, still tall, and still suggestive of a coffee-pot, made more manifest by the stopper attached at the spout by a chain. But in the eighteenth century, teapots underwent a change; they began to assume styles which have endured to the present day. Since Queen Anne sat in the Orangery in Kensington Gardens with her bosom friend “Mrs. Freeman” over a dish of tea to hear of Marlborough’s victories, the habit has become established in popular favour.

The rivalry between coffee and tea and the attempt of chocolate to obtain supremacy are interesting side-lights in social history, tinctured by political bias and prejudice. Coffee claims the field first. The honour of introducing tea remains between the English and the Dutch, while that of coffee rests between the English and the French. The price of tea in 1660 was sixty shillings per pound, and Thomas Garway, tobacconist and coffee-man, was the first who retailed tea. His shop bill is the most curious and historical account of tea we have:

Here is a seventeenth-century advertisement: can Mincing Lane in the twentieth century go better?

As to coffee, it is interesting to read the women’s petition to Parliament, in 1674. They complained that coffee

This is in the vein of the modern Suffragist and on the same sub-head. In 1673 the men of England were fighting against the Dutch at the engagement off Texel to defend their hearths and homes, coffee or no coffee.

Apart from the peculiar lantern shape of the first examples, teapots assumed various forms. They were tall and pear-shaped about 1690. By 1707, is Queen Anne’s day, we find them gourd or melon-shaped till about 1720. In 1725 they were of lesser height. From the opening years of the eighteenth century to 1765, the teapots began to assume round proportions in the body. At a later date they were octagonal. In 1776 they inclined to the Sheraton style, and in 1789 to the Hepplewhite style of design, both these latter with the straight spout.

That the handle was early of ebony is shown in the example illustrated (p. 247), with the London hall-marks of 1745, with the gourd-shaped body. There is something about this example which places it in the realm of the posset-pot. Its cover is surmounted by a cone ornament. Its form, strikingly apart from modern tea-table niceties, marks it as a collector’s piece. Its inscription is of historic interest.

A Kettle and Stand, with spirit-lamp, is of the next year, 1746 (illustrated p. 251). It is the work of the celebrated Paul de Lamerie, whose genius in working in plate placed him in the leading position among the silver designers of his period. It must be remembered that about this time the potter came into serious competition with the silversmith, especially in regard to teapots and coffee-pots. He actually did produce, in the early examples of Bow and Worcester and Coalbrookdale, teapots in blue and white with the same round body as this tea-kettle. The spout of the potter always presented greater difficulties in technique than did the spout of the silversmith. In early types of porcelain it is in form similar to the two silver examples of teapot and tea-kettle of 1745 and 1746. But the potter could not attain to the flutings and chased ornament of the worker in metal. The silversmith’s spout soldered on the body, has spreading ornament eminently suitable to afford strength at the juncture.

In Paul de Lamerie’s work there is, in the graceful convolutions of the handle and the equally delightful curves in the tripod legs, something essentially proper to his craft. No potter could emulate this work. It would be too capricious in firing, and if made in porcelain it would be too fragile for use. It is therefore of interest in comparing the potter’s work with that of his contemporary the plate-worker to see how in rivalry the masters of the latter craft surpassed the worker in clay by making the full use of their own particular technique.

In all possibility the eighteenth century teapots were taken by silver-worker and potter alike from Chinese porcelain prototypes, which must have come over in considerable numbers in the trading days of John Company, as we see that the earliest lantern example of the seventeenth century proceeded from that worthy company, and there was a great number imported from Holland. Whether this be granted or not, it may be laid down as a rough rule for guidance that whenever the silver-worker and the potter produced results closely approaching each other in form, the worker in metal was not availing himself of the best qualities of his art. He may have been following the trammels of fashion, or he may have been a mediocre worker on a lower plane.

That the potter did actually emulate the silversmith can be seen at once in the Staffordshire silver-lustre teapots, which followed as far as possible the silver shapes. They were in use in cottages, and set on the dresser looked very imposing. If the squire’s lady had her silver, or the farmer’s wife her Sheffield plated set, the cottager had her lustre ware.

In the museum at Etruria are some models carved in pear-wood of urns and bowls which Josiah Wedgwood had executed for reproduction in his ware. These remarkable carved wood vessels exhibit a strong similitude to the designs of contemporary silver plate. They illustrate the point that the potter at his highest actually did look with delight on the creations of the silversmith. It was natural that he should do so, and it was equally natural that the contemplation of them should influence his own art. There is a silver teapot designed by John Flaxman (Wedgwood’s great designer). It is melon-shaped, silver gilt, chased with scrolls, medallions, and cupids riding on dolphins. It is inscribed: “Designed by John Flaxman for his esteemed friend and generous patron Josiah Wedgwood, 1784.” The maker’s mark is I.B. under a crown, and the date letter is for 1789.

The Coffee-pot

In regard to the coffee-pot, there is an example of the date of 1686, now on view at the London Museum from the collection of Mr. H. D. Ellis. It will be seen that the coffee-pot was always tall; it never lessened its height to become possessed of the pear or gourd-shaped or circular body of its rival. It actually influenced the height and form of the teapot and it was not until the end of the first quarter of the eighteenth century that the teapot threw off its similitude to the coffee-pot in regard to height; and from that date when tea-drinking had become established, it pursued its own way in design.

The chocolate-pot followed in the wake of the coffee-pot and has never departed very materially from its early form. It is always rather smaller than its prototype, and may be distinguished from the coffee-pot by the handle, which in the chocolate-pot is not set opposite the spout, as is the case in the teapot and the coffee-pot, but is in the middle, set at right-angles to the spout.

It is necessary to examine the customs of the period to arrive at conclusions in regard to silver. In 1697 the Earl of Bristol notes in his diary the payment “of a bill in full to Mr. Chambers for tea-kettle and lamp, weight ninety oz. eleven dwts., at six shillings and two pence.” These tea-kettles were probably no new thing, and, as coffee came first, were possibly a continuation of similar forms for the decoction of coffee. They were the forerunners of the tea-urns which became popular a century later (see illustration p. 325). Tea and coffee and chocolate, ale and broth, and possibly canary, were all drunk by different classes of the community at the same time. Before the introduction of the eighteenth-century teacups—first from Holland and the East and later from our own porcelain factories, in the first stages without handles—the new beverage, especially in remote and unfashionable districts, was drunk from the silver porringers then in use. At the date of the Tatler the middle classes in the country were still content with milk, water-porridge, broth, ale, or small beer for breakfast. The family of John Wesley drank small beer at every meal. By the third quarter of the eighteenth century Jonas Hanway, who introduced the umbrella to England, and John Wesley, both declaimed in vain against the prevalent tea-drinking. Just as in earlier days London apprentices were to have meat in lieu of salmon, then plentiful in the Thames, so country maids accepting service in London stipulated that they were to have tea twice a day.

We are indebted to Catherine of Braganza, the Queen of Charles II, for the introduction of tea. Edmund Waller, the Court poet, who made an oration to the Puritan Parliament and saved his neck, has an “Ode on Tea” eulogizing Catherine and the herb. By the time of Queen Anne tea-drinking had become a fixed habit. Bishop Burnet, who died in 1715, drank twenty-five cups in a morning. There was Dr. Johnson at the other end of the century who drank his sixteen cups at a sitting.

A page of teapots and coffee-pots of varying periods of the eighteenth century shows the styles in vogue (illustrated p. 255). The upper group shows a coffee-pot about 1730 with ebony handle, and rather smaller than some of the later forms. This may be compared with the Newcastle coffee-pot, of 1737, showing similar character (p. 243). This really is the established form of the coffee-pot, which has lasted to the twentieth century, in spite of various deflections in style which were only transitory. By the last quarter of the eighteenth century it had become more ornate in character. Its decoration was rococo in style, and it became massive and impressive in size. It will be observed that in the specimen of about 1775, on the right, the festoons had become a prominent form of ornament. The handles in both these larger and later types are broken, with a point on the lower half turning outwards. The Edinburgh example of 1769 (illustrated p. 321) shows the same character.

An illustration of a fine coffee-pot with the London hall-mark for 1741 is given as a Frontispiece to this volume. It was made by Peter Archambo, and bears his initials P.A. in script in an oval, broken shield. The lines of this example are of exceptional grace. The proportions of the body are well balanced. The circular foot with its fine gradations adds a lightness to the design. The lid is of fine proportions, and is terminated by a plain cone ornament giving height to the piece. The handle is of ebony and of pleasing curves. The shaped spout has a terminal ornament of baluster form joined to the body, which produces an effect at once original and exquisitely harmonious.

This example is produced by the kindness of Messrs. Carrington & Co. It belongs to the stormy years of George II and the war of the Austrian Succession. Frederick of Prussia had seized the rich province of Silesia, as one of the claimants for the dominions of Maria Theresa of Austria. Carteret came into power on the fall of Walpole. “What is it to me,” he said, “who is judge or who is bishop? It is my business to make kings and emperors, and to maintain the balance of Europe.” In 1743, at the Battle of Dettingen, was the last occasion an English sovereign was in the field, until His Majesty George V broke that precedent by visiting the British trenches in Flanders.

The lower group on page 255 belongs to the late George III period. The coffee-pot and teapot on the left belong to the same set. The flat, spreading knob to the lid is a form of ornament which succeeded the long-established baluster form and continued with variations to modern days, and is found in cheap Britannia metal teapots for common use in early nineteenth-century days. The others on the right exhibit novel features. The spreading mouth of the pot surmounted by an overhanging lid is a form which was readily seized by the potter. Some of the early Staffordshire teapots, notably those by Wedgwood, are in this style, as it was an easy shape for the potter to work. The spout, apart from its position low down on the body, is especially a potter’s form. The coffee-pot at the top, in urn form, with its long foot to give it the requisite height, is uncommon and did not long survive. The teapot beneath it has a stand, another innovation adopted by the potter.

The Tea-caddy

The early forms of tea-caddy were square or round. It may be imagined that so precious a beverage had to be stored carefully. Hence the receptacles for tea were somewhat luxurious in character. We illustrate a square type representative of the early days of the eighteenth century (illustrated p. 259). This example was made at Exeter. The South Sea Bubble was just about to be blown at the formation of the South Sea Company to take over the national debt. Such a specimen is of rarity and is worth about £40 or £50. The round example adjacent is of London make with the hall-marks for 1730, in the opening years of George II, straight from the days when Sir Robert Walpole governed England.

The late eighteenth-century types were oval in form. The illustration of two examples (p. 259) shows this style. The left-hand one is in date 1775, and its fellow has the London hall-marks for 1784. These show very clearly the evolution in form culminating in the satinwood Sheraton variety tea-caddy so much sought after by collectors. The lines of the silversmith became coincident with the worker in rare woods. They touch at this date. If one takes Chippendale’s Director or Sheraton’s design books we can see the progress of the cabinet-maker, first in mahogany and then in satin and other beautifully coloured woods, in arriving at a casket similar in character to the silver-worker’s design.

Half-way between the early and late eighteenth century styles we illustrate (p. 263) a set of Tea-caddies and a Sugar-box, in date 1760, showing where the silversmith adhered to the higher plane of his technique, equally evading the plagiarism of the potter or the cabinet-maker. This set of three vessels is indisputably metal in every inch of their construction. The bases are reminiscent of the floral refinements of the Charles II and James II periods. The bowls have a rotundity and exquisite sprightliness in form, relieved by chasing that defies the woodworker and cannot be imitated by the potter. The knobs appertain so strongly to the metal-worker that they are inimitable. This set, therefore, stands as being exceptionally interesting in exhibiting the work of the artist in silver kept on a high level apart from extraneous influences.

The later teapot cannot be said to have much to commend it, if it be with straight spout and of oval or geometric form. Oftentimes it is a woodworker’s design with additions. The cabinet-maker has not essayed to make a wooden teapot. But the silversmith has completed the hiatus. Take the tea-caddy of 1784 (illustrated p. 259), add a straight metal spout and a handle; the result is a teapot; but it can hardly lay claim to being in the first rank of design. It stands with the modern potter’s results, exceptionally fine in their own field—round, hexagonal, octagonal, oval, square, or of many other forms, all suited to his plastic art, but the silver-worker should stand on a plane apart, and in the best periods he did.

SALE PRICES

COFFEE-POTS.

TEAPOTS.

TEA-KETTLES.

TEA-CADDIES.

---