Lacquer - Oriental Methods - European Importations and Limitations - Prices - An Ambassador's Report - Singerie, Chinoiserie and Rocaille - The Dutch Decadence - Interiors of Cornelis Troost - Mirrors - Wealth and Luxury of Dutch Merchants - Court Contrast - Tapestry - Brussels as a Centre of Art and Luxury - Eighteenth Century Furniture - The Empire Style in the Low Countries - Dutch Homes of the Nineteenth Century - The Maarken House and Furniture - Typical Farmhouse and Furniture - Country Seats and Town Houses - Hindeloopen Houses and Furniture - A Fries-land House - Canal Boat Furniture - Dutch Love of Symmetry - Collectors and Collections.

SO far little attention has been paid in these pages to lacquer, though important articles of household furniture that owed their beauty and value to this species of ornamentation have appeared in inventories and diaries under the designation of "vernish," "japan" or "japanned." Sometimes this work was referred to as "black" merely, as in the case of John Hervey's "dear wife's" boudoir.

The Oriental method of lacquering requires a vast amount of patience and skill. After the wood has been smoothly planed, it is covered with a thin sheet of paper or silk gauze. Over this is spread a thick coating of buffalo's gall and powdered red sandstone. When dry, this is rubbed with wax and polished, or washed over with gum and chalk. The varnish is laid on with a flat brush. The article is now thoroughly dried, and again moistened and polished with a piece of soft slate, or the stalks of a special grass. The workman then repeats the process, giving it a second coating of lacquer, and again dries and polishes it. Sometimes as many as eighteen or twenty coatings are applied, but never less than three.

The lacquer used by the Chinese and Japanese is derived from the juice of the "varnish tree." This juice, a natural secretion, is acrid, and soon hardens into a black resin. To obtain it, pieces of bamboo are inserted into the bark and allowed to remain all night, for the juice flows more freely at night than during the day. This is boiled with equal parts of oil obtained from the fruit of the mimusops elengi. The chief trees that yield this gum are the black varnish tree (melanor-rhoea usitata) and the Japan varnish tree (rhus vernici-fera).

There are grades in lacquer. Lacquer on a gold ground is the most highly prized; and the first examples of this kind that reached Europe were gifts to Dutch officials from Japanese princes. This sort of lacquer is seldom found on furniture, with the exception of delicate little boxes and occasionally plaques that were inserted into furniture.

Lacquered wares were brought into Holland, England and France in large quantities all through the seventeenth century, as the bills of lading (see page 292) show. We have seen that the European merchants sent out designs for forms and decorations of Oriental porcelain; and they did the same for carved ebony, teak and ivory, and especially lacquer. Many of the screens, clocks, bedsteads, cabinets, panels, tables, etc., of the period show unmistakable signs of Oriental attempts to supply European demands. In textiles also, especially in screen-fillings, and other textiles used in upholstery for couches, chairs and hangings, we frequently find views of Dutch towns and social life, indoors and outdoors.

The framework of large pieces of furniture was sometimes both carved on the edges, and the flat surfaces were lacquered. Sometimes the frames of screens were of carved rosewood (home-made), and the apertures were filled with genuine Eastern textiles. Tables of inlaid ivory and mother-of-pearl were also in general vogue.

Lacquered furniture was highly prized and very costly during the days of William of Orange, our "Dutch William." "A grand Japan cabinet" (probably award-robe) in the bedroom of a Countess in 1675 was valued at £200 in present money. In 1698 an "Indian trunk" is listed at £35 in money of that date. In valuations that might be perhaps multiplied fivefold to-day in actual cash, apart from appreciation in art or sentimental value, we find also: a pair of India cut Japan screens, £60; a black bureau, £6; a Japan scrutoire, £60; a Japan cabinet, £35; and India-cut Japan frame and glasses, £10 10s.

We have seen from the complaint of the japanners in England that strong attempts had been made to imitate the home demands; and considerable success had rewarded the efforts of the artists and cabinetmakers. The trouble was that they could not obtain the proper lacquer or "vernish" in England, France or Holland for many years. The Dutch, holding such a dominant position in the East Indies, practically throughout the seventeenth century, naturally had the best chance to discover the secret of the constitution and manufacture of the far-famed varnish. They tried to reproduce the Oriental product of lacquer just as persistently as they did the porcelain with delft. Good as their imitations were, however, they could not produce a lacquer that could compete with the Japanese any more than the English could. They used native varnishes, therefore, and produced beautiful work which, alas! was not destined to last. The surface soon cracked, scaled off and left the framework decrepit and friendless, - relegated to the attic, kitchen or wood pile.

As Dutch enterprise led the way in imitations of Oriental wares, of porcelain in delft, so also imitations of lacquer first found fame in the Netherlands. A Dutchman named Huygens was famous for his japanned work early in the eighteenth century. He was called to France, and was probably largely instrumental in the invention or perfection of the celebrated Vernis Martin. This was a species of lacquer that beautifies many sumptuous examples of Louis Quinze furniture, and is highly prized by collectors.

The character of lacquered and other Oriental wares obtainable early in the eighteenth century may be gathered from the report of an ambassador to Pekin in 1721. Among other things he says: