Generally speaking, the antique-shops of Italy are more satisfactory than those of any other country because of the fire and verve with which the Italian shopkeepers fight against attempts to make them lower their prices; because of the inventiveness and resource of the ancient Italian furniture artists in turning out the best worm-holes known to science; and because of the enormous number of places where ancient and mediæval art objects can be bought for as little as eight dollars per object—duplicates obtainable from Fifteenth Century craftsmen at a moment’s notice.
A very charming American lady recently declared that of all the Italian cities, Florence was the most fascinating and attractive. She had not, however, been fascinated or attracted by the scenery or the architecture or the churches or the picture galleries. “Why,” she explained, “you can get antiques there at half the prices that you have to pay in Rome and about a quarter of what you have to pay in Paris!”
This fascinating feature is due to the fact that there are so many Cinque Cento artisans still living in Florence. Nevertheless, the French antique-shops are superior in general grace and style to the Italian because the ancient Italian workmen now living in Florence lack a certain dash and spirit which seem to be common to the French—except in the matter of making worm-holes.
The Italian worm-holes stand at the very pinnacle of the worm-hole world; and when an antique Italian workman really exerts himself to worm-hole a piece of oak, the French workman stands aside in reverential amazement. The French workman, however, has the dash.
Before purchasing antiques in Europe, one should acquaint himself with the various brands of dash which may be observed in different sorts of furniture. French furniture dash, for example, is much dashier than Bavarian or Ukrainian dash. Czecho-Slovak dash and Bulgarian dash are quite dissimilar. Subscriptions are even now being taken by the American Academy for the Popularization of Antiquities to establish classes in furniture dash.†
————
† Donations for this worthy cause may be sent in the form of certified checks, postage stamps, or unused golf balls to Dr. Milton Kilgallen, Floral Park City, Florida.
The average Italian antique-dealer will crowd into a given space, say, four wooden candlesticks made to represent four angels, two or three Venetian glass mirrors, a Savonarola chair, seventeen pieces of china, three wooden chests containing fifty-six square feet of surface and eleven miles of worm-holes, a dozen venerable and tattered altar cloths, made by ancient weavers and embroiderers in Naples in 1919, and a few wrought-iron odds and ends removed from a palace in the purlieus of Pisa by a prominent palace-wrecker.
Plate VIII
