Editorial note — INDEX

Every art, he says, must adapt itself to the country where it is practised; and so we Germans have set all kinds of knobs and rings on our glasses, so that they may be somewhat stronger and more lasting, and be more easily held in the hands of fuddled and clumsy folk (‘von vollen und ungeschicklichen Leuten’). This quotation is from one of the Lutheran pastor’s ‘sermons’ on glass (see below, p. 262). Mathesius lived in what has been called ‘the classical age of German thirst,’ and was ever ready to gird at the failings of his contemporaries in this respect.