bishop of Bangor. In January 1737 Potter was unexpectedly appointed to succeed Wake in the see of Canterbury. He died on the 10th of October 1747. His Theological Works, consisting of sermons, charges, divinity lectures and the Discourse on Church Government, were published in 3 vols. 8vo, in 1753.
POTTER, PAUL (1625-1654), Dutch animal painter, was born at Enkhuizen, Holland. He was instructed in art by his father, Peter Potter, a landscape and figure painter of some merit, and by Nicolas Moeyaert, of Amsterdam. Other masters and influences are mentioned by various writers, but more than any other of his contemporaries he learnt through direct study from nature. By the time he had attained his fifteenth year his productions were already much esteemed. In 1646 he went to Delft, where he became a member of the gild of St Luke. At the age of twenty he settled at the Hague, and there married in 1650. He was patronized by Maurice, prince of Orange, for whom he painted the life-size picture of the “Young Bull,” now one of the most celebrated works in the gallery of the Hague. In 1652 he was induced by Burgomaster Tulp of Amsterdam to remove to that city. His constitution seems to have been feeble, and his health suffered from the unremitting diligence with which he pursued his art. He died on the 15th of January 1654 at the age of twenty-nine.
His paintings are generally small; early in life, however, he attempted, but with ill success, to work on a monumental scale, as in the “Bear Hunt” at the Rijks Museum and the “Boar Hunt” of the Carstanjen collection, Berlin. Even the famous “Equestrian Portrait of Tulp” in the Six collection, Amsterdam, is awkward and stiff and hard in handling. His animals are designed with careful accuracy, while the landscape backgrounds are introduced with spirit and appropriateness. His colour is clear and transparent, his execution firm and finished without being laboured. His view of nature is purely objective and unemotional; he painted with the greatest directness and simplicity the things he saw before him, and his paintings of horses and cattle are so individualized that they become faithful portraits of the animals. The best among his small portraits of horses are in the Louvre and in the Schwerin Gallery; and certain of his studies are the most brilliant of all.
The earliest dated picture of importance is “Abraham Entering Into Canaan” (1642), at the Germanic Museum in Nuremberg, in which he makes the Scriptural subject an excuse for painting the patriarch's herds, just as in his “Orpheus” of 1650 (Rijks Museum, Amsterdam) he makes similar use of the Greek myth. Among his finest works on a small scale are a cattle piece (1653) in the Duc d'Arenberg's collection, and a similar, though earlier, picture in the Munich Pinakothek. In spite of his early death Paul Potter produced a great number of works. He worked with feverish application, as though he were aware of the short span of life that was granted him. He executed a series of some twenty etchings, mainly of animals, which are simple and direct in method and handling. Here, as in painting, his precocity was remarkable: his large plate of the “Herdsman,” produced when he was only eighteen, and that of the “Shepherd,” which dates from the following year, show him at his best as an accomplished master of the point.
Potter's works have been engraved by Bartolozzi, Danckerts, Visscher, Le Bas and others. Authentic paintings from his brush command very considerable prices. At the Stover sale in 1890 “The Dairy Farm” realized the record price of £6090. There are two of his paintings at the National Gallery, three in Buckingham Palace and a few in the duke of Westminster's collection. On the continent of Europe the most numerous and representative examples are to be found at the Rijks Museum in Amsterdam, the Hermitage in St Petersburg, and the Dresden Gallery.
See Paulus Potter, sa vie et ses œuvres, by T. van Westrheene (the Hague, 1867); Eaux-fortes de Paul Potter, by Georges Gratet Duplessis; and an old but interesting volume, Paul Potter, peintre de l'école hollandaise, by C. L. F. Lecarpentier (Rouen, 1818). (P. G. K.)
POTTER, PHILIP CIPRIANI HAMBLEY (1792-1871), English musician, was born in London, the son of a pianoforte teacher, and godson of a sister of G. B. Cipriani, the painter. He was educated for the musical profession under Attwood, Callcott, Crotch and Woelfl; later at Vienna, where he received encouragement from Beethoven. In 1816 an overture by him was performed at a Philharmonic concert, and he began a distinguished career as a pianist. In 1822 he became a professor, and in 1832 principal (resigning in 1859) of the Royal Academy of Music; in 1860 an exhibition was founded there in his honour. Cipriani Potter composed many works, now mostly forgotten, though important in their day. He died on the 28th of September 1871.
POTTERIES, THE, a name popularly applied to a district of north Staffordshire, the principal seat of the china and earthenware industry in England. It lies in the valley of the Trent a little south of its source, and extends into tributary valleys and up the hills iianking them. For a distance of 9 m. from south-east to north-west, and about 3 m. from north-east to south-west, the district resembles one great town, but the chief centres are Burslem, Hanley, Longton, Stoke-on-Trent, Fenton and Tunstall. Under the “Potteries federation” scheme (1908) these towns were amalgamated in 1910 as one municipal borough under the name of Stoke-on-Trent. Newcastle-under-Lyme, though not sharing in the staple industry, may also be reckoned in the district. Among the lesser manufacturing centres Etruria, ranking as a suburb of Hanley, is well known for its connexion with Josiah Wedgwood, who founded works here in 1769. The Wedgwoods and the Mintons are the two most famous family names connected with the china industry of the district. Coal and coarse clay are the only local natural products necessary to the industry; the finer clay and other ingredients are brought from Cornwall and elsewhere. Ironstone is raised in the district. The North Staffordshire and London & North-Western railways and the Grand Trunk canal are the principal means of communication.
POTTHAST, AUGUST, (1824–1898), German historian, was born at Höxter on the 13th of August 1824, and was educated at Paderborn, Münster and Berlin. He assisted G. H. Pertz, the editor of the Monumenta Germaniae Historica, and edited the Regesta pontificum romanorum, 1198–1304 (Berlin, 1874–1875). From 1874 to 1894 he was librarian of the German Reichstag. Potthast is chiefly known through his monumental Bibliotheca historica medii aevi (1862), a guide to the sources of European history in the middle ages. The work, in the form of an index, gives particulars of practically all the historical writers of Europe and their work between 375 and 1500. A new and enlarged edition appeared at Berlin in 1896. Potthast died on the 13th of February 1898.
POTTINGER, ELDRED (1811-1843), Anglo-Indian soldier and diplomatist, entered the Bombay Artillery in 1827, and after some years of regimental duty was appointed to the political department under Colonel (afterwards Sir Henry) Pottinger. In 1837 he made a journey through Afghanistan in disguise. Arriving at Herat, he found it threatened by a Persian army (with which were some Russian officers) and immediately made himself known to the Afghan commander, offering his services. The attack which soon followed was conducted with the greatest vigour, but the defence, inspired by Pottinger, was invariably successful, and after a year the siege was raised. For this great service Pottinger was thanked by the governor-general, the earl of Auckland, made brevet-major, and also received the C.B. He was also appointed political officer at Herat. In 1841 he was political officer in Kohistan when the revolt against Shah Shuja broke out there. Taking refuge with the Gurkha garrison of Charikar, Major Pottinger stood a siege of fourteen days, and then made an adventurous retreat to Kabul. Less than a fortnight after his arrival Sir William Macnaghten was murdered, and Pottinger succeeded to his position as envoy to the Afghan court. The apathy of the military leaders made resistance hopeless, and it only remained to negotiate for the withdrawal of the British mission. Pottinger himself was one of the hostages handed over to Akbar Khan, and thus escaped the massacre in the Khyber Pass. Released, after many months' captivity, by Sir George Pollock's army, he returned to India, and a year later died while visiting Hong-Kong.
POTTO, the native name of the West African slow-lemurs, popularly miscalled “sloths,” and scientifically known as Perodicticus, a name referring to the aborted condition of the index finger, which forms their most distinctive feature. The ordinary potto (P. potto) is about the size of a squirrel, but with
