at Ashburton to refresh himself and his horse. After having lunched, he took up a copy of Sir Charles Grandison, in seven volumes, began to read, read on and on, finished one volume, took up the next, forgot all about his purpose of going to Exeter, and was found by the Friends on their return from that town, and the conclusion of the meeting, still immersed in Samuel Richardson's novel. As novel-reading is forbidden in the Society, no doubt but that poor Cookworthy was severely reprimanded, and prayed for as a back-slider.
Porcelain in China has a high antiquity, and must have been made there at least 1250 years before it was manufactured in England; it was introduced into Europe in 1518, when it acquired the name of China. For a long period it was supposed that the fine white clay consisting of silica and alumina, and called by the Chinese Kaolin was found only in the Celestial Empire, and specimens brought to Europe fetched a high price. At the beginning of the eighteenth century it was discovered in Saxony in an odd way. A merchant named Schnorr, being on a journey, was struck with the whiteness of some clay near Schneeburg, and collecting some of it, thinking it might be employed instead of wheaten flour for the manufacture of hair powder, used it for this purpose. It succeeded, but had this disadvantage, that wigs dressed with the new hair powder were very heavy. An apothecary named Bötcher noticed the increased weight of his wig and instituted inquiries, when he found that the new material used was precisely that which was required for the manufacture of porcelain; and Dresden china was begun to be made by him in 1709, and was carried on with the greatest secrecy, and the exportation of the earth was forbidden under heavy penalties.
In 1745, Cookworthy heard that a similar clay had been
