On an Old Plate

YEARS ago, in that misguided time when every new little house with three gables called itself “ Queen Anne,” we rented a “ Queen Anne villa ” for a summer on the Straits of Fuca. Number 16 Bird-Cage Walk, James’ Bay, Victoria, B. C., was the address, and I remember we were quite vain of it, having come from a place with “ city ” tacked to its name, in the then Territory of Idaho.

The cottage was new, and so was most of its plenishing ; only now and then we came upon some waif relic of old-country housekeeping, such as the lustreware plate. Perhaps it should be called a dish, the notion of a plate being something round ; for it was square, with a wavy edge turned down, as a seamstress says, by hand. Much of its distinction of shape and coloring came from that appealing fallibility of the human touch.

Miss Gowrie, our Scotch landlady, thought so little of this plate that she did not even mention it in the inventory, — though her eyesight and memory were both good, — when it came to drawing up that document; and I may say there was little else she did not mention.

We were its discoverers, by accident, while seeking quite another and poorer thing. It did not answer the purpose of the lemon-squeezer we were in search of, but it made us forget about lemons and eke squeezers when we came upon it in the kitchen cupboard, where it had taken a permanent back seat.

I have no shame in confessing that I had never looked into that cupboard before ; this was summer housekeeping, and I was on very tender terms with my little old English " maid,” by courtesy the cook. Her gray hairs, her fifty years, and her manner of the upper servant come down in life quite precluded anything so paltry as prying into cupboards or noticing a tendency to monotony in the puddings.

To this day I can see Miss Gowrie’s face of amazement when she recognized her old kitchen plate on the best parlor table (the one with weak legs), doing duty as a card-receiver. I will not say it was piled with the cards of the resident gentry, but there may have been a name or two, naturally on top, which Miss Gowrie knew and respected. It was evident from her expression that the combination struck her as uncanonical, — or rather as unorthodox, for she was no giddy Churchwoman.

We passed it off with praises of the plate, and tried to beguile her of a story as to its history ; but she would not encourage such morbid preferment. It was against the established order of things that kitchen plates should be seen on parlor tables, displaying the names of the local aristocracy as if they were cold potatoes or slices of bacon. It was in vain we called her attention to the serious merits of the plate, — its individuality, its “ frankness,” its lovely old corners blunted as if dog’s-eared by use, the rich burnish of its lustre border, the charm of its very lack-lustre where the burnish in places seemed to have dribbled off the edge, the quality of its rare old watery pink beneath the burnish, and finally the heart-stirring patriotism embodied in the legend in the centre of the plate. It has a plain white centre, old white, laced across with faint cracks, — not contemplated in the design, — like wrinkles in a clean old face. Upon this field is done in bold black and white the portrait of a frigate under full sail, “ from truck to taffrail dressed,” carrying thirteen guns on a side, and flying the British naval ensign. Under the picture, framed in horns of plenty and handsome pen-and-ink scrollwork, is the motto : —

Two small holes bored in the upper rim of the plate show that its place was on the wall of some loyal Briton’s home. Had the plate been silver, with a coat of arms or an ancient guild-mark on it, or porcelain, bearing some famous factor’s stamp, it is possible Miss Gowrie’s memory might not have failed her so completely ; but, humble as it was, she knew it not, she denied it, could not recall a name or a place connected with its past. Seeing us so foolish about it, she begged us to call it our own, and washed her hands there and then of all further complicity in our use of it.

We carried it away with the rest of the summer’s booty, and we have it still; though not a Christmas comes but we think of some friend to whom we might fitly send it, — one of those for whom it is so difficult to choose a gift out of the shops, since they " have everything ; ” but invariably we harden our hearts ; the thing is at once too cheap and too dear. To how many uses — without being ever of the slightest use — has it been put, in our rolling-stone housekeeping! If something is wanted to put something on which nobody ever uses, like the impersonal penholders on bedroom tables, there is the old Victoria plate. If there is a shelf that lacks character, or a corner where nothing else will “go,” there it is again! Its copper and pink and strong black lines are always a welcome note ; it is never too new or too smart; it has the double gift of adaptability and sincerity, two very good qualities in an old housemate.

We have one other piece of pottery that talks, but in how different a language ! It is one of a pair of Guadalajara water-coolers, — tall, bottle-shaped jars of unglazed clay, with necks just large enough for the clasp of a woman’s hand. They are a pair, but not alike. The chosen vessel to which the potter confided his secret has a design of passion - flowers between stripes of terra cotta and black running round the bilge. In this band of color a space is left for the inscription : —

The peasant potter had no skill of his pen or brush; he was better at thumbing clay than writing dedications to the fair. Two of his four words are abbreviated, and the Spanish is barely legible, but it is easy to read the language of love and hospitality. The invitation is a pledge full of the poetry of the South.

Some ruthless disillusionists have said that water-jars inscribed to Tomasitas and Juanitas and Emilitas are no more personal, in the land where they grow, than stone-china mugs on five-cent counters “ For a Good Child.” We scout the sordid suggestion. Yet, granting that it were true, and that the trail of Commerce is over our gentle Indian jar equally with our bold British plate, how different is the appeal, how typical of the two races of buyers !

Public spirit, national pride, a touch of private greed, perhaps, a pious welcome to Trade, with a battle-ship all ready to persuade her if she be coy, and the ship’s guns to defend her when persuaded, — these are the sentiments to lure coin out of stout British pockets. But the Southern merchant pipes to custom in a different key. He knows that he must strike his victim a little higher than the pocket; yet he need not aim quite so far as the country’s need.

Guadalajara clay is of a peculiar, silky fineness, and it takes a polish as smooth and pallid as a girl’s cheek blanched by moonlight; its touch, when filled with water, is as cool as her bare arm on the fountain curb. His fountain is miles away over dusty roads, but the jar goes empty past a dozen wells of strangers. It is for her to christen with her lips, or reject and condemn it to perpetual drought. He brings it safe to the brink ; she is with him, and it is the moonlight of his dreams. The pigeons are nestling, lumps of sleepy feathers, on the Mission wall; the white-faced callas are awake, — they crowd around the fountain and rustle their cold leaves against her knees. They peer in, framing her darker image that floats inverted on the water. He leans and dips where his own reflection lies, but the ripples spread, and she laughs to see herself dispersed by his reluctant hand.

Did Tomasita help herself like a generous girl, and pledge her lover in his “ draught divine ” ? — or did she drink from the lips only, and mock his thirst ?

Her jar has been ours, by the vulgar right of purchase, for more than twenty years, and, counting time for what time is worth in Mexico, Tomasita must be a grandmother now, not without cost of a few wrinkles ; but to us she is one of the immortal maidens whose moon of love shall never set. So much four words scrawled on a clay bottle can do.

Whenever a craftsman has kneaded a thought into his work, whether it be woman or country, hospitality or gain, it will go on speaking for him when his own clay is dumb. His gift will continue to praise the fair one long after he has forgotten her ; his message will invigorate or charm us when plates are empty and bottles have gone dry.

This is what we say to our disillusionist when he claims that all things are for sale, in this world. It may be so; but we think that in every bargain something is released that no price can limit, something passes from seller to buyer which the one does not pay for nor the other supply.