Elite households in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries indulged in spectacular dessert courses dramatically set with mirrored plateaux, ceramic figurines, and real and artificial flowers. Sweet jellies - clear or colored confections flavored with spices and fruit - added a rainbow of colors to the well-appointed table, the cut decoration lavished on each glass further enhancing their presentation. The bellflowers and fluting on this example suggest the Washingtons probably acquired it as part of a larger set in the 1790s. It matches two others in Mount Vernon's collection, all with a history of ownership in the family of Martha Washington's youngest granddaughter, Eleanor "Nelly" Parke Custis Lewis.