Pair of antique hand painted Mercury glass vases

I'm selling both of these mercury glass pieces together because they came in together.They are hand blown. I am calling them vases but actually they will not hold water because there are deliberate 1/4" holes in the bottom of each of them.Suitable for dried or artificial flowers only. They are 4 1/2" tall and each are hand painted with a single flower. Some paint loss and loss to the silvering which is typical. First discovered in early nineteenth-century Germany, mercury glass was used as an inexpensive and tarnish-free alternative for objects such as silver candlesticks, vases and goblets. Its popularity traveled quickly to both France and England and by 1853 the New England Glass Company created a sensation at the New York Crystal Palace Exhibition with a lavish mercury glass display. Looking not quite like silver and not quite like mirror, these shimmering glass objects gleamed in the shadowy, gas-lit rooms of that period. But before we go any further, let us clear up some confusion: There is no mercury in mercury glass. It is clear glass, mold-blown and coated on the inside with a silvering formula. Most serious collectors prefer to call it silvered glass, but that too leads to confusion as the silvering formula doesn't actually contain any silver!