"Bernard Of The Tuileries"
by
Opposite the entrance to the Sevres Museum in the old town of Sevres, in France, stands a handsome bronze statue of Bernard Palissy, the potter. Within the museum are some exquisite pieces of pottery known as “Palissy ware.” They are specimens of the art of Palissy, who spent the best years of his life toiling to discover the mode of making white enamel.
The story of his trials and sufferings in seeking to learn the secret, and of his final triumph over all difficulties, is an inspiring one.
Born in the south of France, as far back as the year 1509, Bernard Palissy did not differ much from an intelligent, high-spirited American boy of the twentieth century. His parents were poor, and he had few of the advantages within the reach of the humblest child in the United States to-day. In spite of poverty, he was cheerful, light hearted, and happy in his great love for nature, which distinguished him all through life. The forest was his playground, his companions the birds, insects, and other living things that made their home there.
From the first, Nature was his chief teacher. It was from her, and her alone, he learned the lessons that in after years made him famous both as a potter and a scientist. The habit of observation seemed natural to him, for without suggestions from books or older heads, his eyes and ears noticed all that the nature student of our day is drilled into observing.
The free, outdoor life of the forest helped to give the boy the strength of mind and body which afterward enabled him, in spite of the most discouraging conditions, to pursue his ideal. He was taught how to read and write, and from his father learned how to paint on glass. From him he also learned the names and some of the properties of the minerals employed in painting glass. All the knowledge that in after years made him an artist, a scientist, and a writer, was the result of his unaided study of nature. To books he was indebted for only the smallest part of what he knew.
Happy and hopeful, sunshiny of face and disposition, Bernard grew from childhood to youth. Then, when he was about eighteen, there came into his heart a longing to try his fortune in the great world which lay beyond his forest home. Like most country-bred boys of his age, he felt that he had grown too large for the parent nest and must try his wings elsewhere. In his case there was, indeed, little to induce an ambitious boy to stay at home. The trade of glass painting, which in previous years had been a profitable one, had at that time fallen somewhat out of favor, and there was not enough work to keep father and son busy.
When he shouldered his scanty wallet and bade farewell to father and mother, and the few friends and neighbors he knew in the straggling forest hamlet, Bernard Palissy closed the first chapter of his life. The second was a long period of travel and self-education.
He wandered through the forest of Ardennes, making observations and collecting specimens of minerals, plants, reptiles, and insects. He spent some years in the upper Pyrenees, at Tarbes. From Antwerp in the east he bent his steps to Brest, in the most westerly part of Brittany, and from Montpellier to Nismes he traveled across France. During his wanderings he supported himself by painting on glass, portrait painting (which he practiced after a fashion), surveying, and planning sites for houses and gardens. In copying or inventing patterns for painted windows, he had acquired a knowledge of geometry and considerable skill in the use of a rule and compass. His love of knowledge for its own sake made him follow up the study of geometry, as far as he could pursue it, and hence his skill as a surveyor.