Though only a glass-painter, he had the soul of an artist.

The sight of an elegant Italian cup disturbed his whole existence and from that moment the determination to discover the enamel with which it was glazed possessed him like a passion.

For months and years he tried all kinds of experiments to learn the materials of which the enamel was compounded.

He built a furnace, which was a failure, and then a second, burning so much wood, spoiling so many drugs and pots of common earthenware, and losing so much time, that poverty stared him in the face, and he was forced, from lack of ability to buy fuel, to try his experiments in a common furnace.

Flat failure was the result, but he decided on the spot to begin all over again, and soon had three hundred pieces baking, one of which came out covered with beautiful enamel.
To perfect his invention he next built a glass-furnace, carrying the bricks on his back.