Although these were made in the same way, the overlay is far more delicately carved and often even the thickness of the overlay is controlled to create shading. They normally used opaque white bottles as the background but some were also worked on other opaque colours. So far, I have never seen any on the clear or snowflake backgrounds. The photograph* shows a fine seal school bottle depicting a pair of cats at play with hovering insects amongst the flowers. On each side there is a bowl of fruit on a table and on the reverse is another scene of a drunken poet asleep in a garden. (*See the photograph by clicking on the link at the end of this article).

Layers of Glass - Apart from these overlay types there are many interesting mottled, swirling and colourful designs as well as the plain colour bottles, both uncarved and carved.

Many of these were quite complex in the way they were made: some were blown into moulds then finished by hand; others involved blowing a clear glass into a mould but then another layer was blown inside the first bottle. This layer was a thin colourful one, sandwiched by yet a third clear layer that was also blown in. When looking down at the neck of one of these bottles you can clearly see these three layers.

A variety of colours were successfully used, together with gold in the creation of snuff bottles. There is no doubt that their advanced knowledge acquired in firing porcelain, and how metallic oxides react, was put to good use in glass.

It has also been suggested that apart from mixing in metals, even small particles of precious gemstones such as Sapphires, Emeralds and Rubies were added to the molten glass.

Particular attention was given to the feel of the finished material, which was achieved by the type of polishing and even the weight was controlled by the addition of lead. With transparent bottles the inside could be controlled and made to appear crazed as these names suggest - Cracked Ice, Fish Net or Sea Spray.

Most of the really fine snuff bottles were made in the Imperial Workshop and other small glass works around Peking.

Stone Imitations - With such expertise the Chinese were able to make astounding imitations of other materials. There are many bottles that look and feel just like Jade, Aquamarine, Agate and other stones. There has been a view in the past that the Chinese made these as fakes with the intention to deceive. I am sure that this was not the case, as it was far too easy to find them out by careful inspection. Under magnification little holes on the surface that could not be polished out and tiny bubbles would be seen proving it must be glass. Lastly, glass unlike the stones can be scratched quite easily by steel.

The Chinese enjoyed making convincing imitations of highly valued minerals as a demonstration of their skill. One other mineral cleverly copied was Realgar with its bright red and yellow swirling colours, impossible to use because of a high arsenic content, so these copies would have caused a lot of intrigue.

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