riceless
workmanship, a set of blackwood furniture, and all the medals that his
work had won for him in England, France, Germany, and America. He was a
very quiet and cat-like man, and spoke almost in a whisper. Would we be
pleased to inspect the manufactory? He led us through a garden--it was
nothing in his eyes, but we stopped to admire long. Stone lanterns,
green with moss, peeped through clumps of papery bamboos where bronze
storks were pretending to feed. A dwarfed pine, its foliage trimmed to
dish-like plaques, threw its arms far across a fairy pond where the fat,
lazy carp grubbed and rooted, and a couple of eared grebes squawked at
us from the protection of the--waterbutt. So perfect was the silence of
the place that we heard the cherry blossoms falling into the water and
the lisping of the fish against the stones. We were in the very heart of
the Willow-Pattern Plate and loath to move for fear of breaking it. The
Japanese are born bower-birds. They collect water-worn stones, quaintly
shaped rocks, and veined pebbles for the ornamentation of their homes.
When they shift house they take the garden away with them--pine trees
and all--and the incoming tenant has a free hand.

Half a dozen steps took us over the path of mossy stones to a house
where the whole manufactory was at work. One room held the enamel
powders all neatly arranged in jars of scrupulous cleanliness, a few
blank copper vases ready to be operated on, an invisible bird who
whistled and whooped in his cage, and a case of gaily painted
butterflies ready for reference when patterns were wanted. In the next
room sat the manufactory--three men, five women, and two boys--all as
silent as sleep. It is one thing to read of _cloissonnee_ making, but
quite another to watch it being made. I began to understand the cost of
the ware when I saw a man working out a pattern of sprigs and
butterflies on a plate about ten inches in diameter. With finest silver
ribbon wire, set on edge, less than the sixteenth of an inch high, he
followed the curves of the drawing at his side, pinching the wire into
tendrils and the serrated outlines of leaves with infinite patience. A
rough touch on the raw copper-plate would have sent the pattern flying
into a thousand disconnected threads. When all was put down on the
copper, the plate would be warmed just sufficiently to allow the wires
to stick firmly to the copper, the pattern then showing in raised
lines. Followed the colourin