COLONIAL TRIGLE-STOOL, DISCOVERED IN A NEW HAMPSHIRE WOODSHED, AND PURCHASED FOR A MERE SONG BY PROFESSOR KILGALLEN
As one of the legs was partially missing, it is believed that the owners considered this rare old piece valueless. Professor Kilgallen has not allowed any restorations to be made. The profane hands of the modern reproducer of old furniture have never been permitted to touch any articles of his collection.
In the same space the average French dealer seems unable to find room for more than one dough-trough, two pewter plates with the salamander of Francis I done on them in repoussé, a pair of Louis XIV curling-tongs, and a washed-out-looking portrait of a satin-clad and powdered-haired lady whose face has the lop-sided aristocratic appearance that will only be found in true aristocrats or in persons who have been kicked by mules perchance in their early days. And the portraits which are on sale in every Parisian antique-shop are sometimes most valuable because the general unpleasantness of the aristocrats which they represent serves to make every beholder wonder why the French Revolution didn’t start exterminating aristocrats about a hundred years sooner.
At any rate, the superior shop-filling ability of the Italian dealers is one reason why it is far easier to indulge one’s passion for antiqueing in Italy than in France.
A disappointing feature about the French antique-shops is the apparent indifference of the shopkeepers to the attempts of customers to engage them in violent and interesting altercations over the prices of their wares. This is a modern phase of the antique-business and ranks, in France, with such inexplainable matters as why man-sized boys wear little tight knickerbockers that come only halfway down to the knee, and why a Parisian who apparently lives in comfort in his home or a hotel with the thermometer down to forty degrees will shriek with anguish when any one raises a window in a railway compartment in which the temperature is hovering around ninety-four degrees.
In the old days when a Parisian antique-dealer placed a price of fifteen hundred francs on an article, the prospective buyer offered five hundred for it, and then the argument began. The dealer shed tears; swore that his business standing would be shattered if he dropped a centime in price; mentioned his sick wife most touchingly; gave a long history of the antique in question, showing its great value; beat his breast and begged the purchaser not to ruin him; and ended by selling the article for seven hundred francs.
To-day, when a Parisian dealer places a price of fifteen hundred francs on an article and the customer offers five hundred for it, the dealer is more than likely to smile quietly but contemptuously, remark, “M’sieu jests,” and refuse to converse further on the matter. This removes the zest from the proceeding. One does not care to purchase antiques as one purchases collars; one goes elsewhere.
III
OF THE APPROVED METHOD OF DOING BUSINESS WITH AN ITALIAN DEALER—OF THE ARTISTIC DECEPTION OF THE CUSTOMER—OF THE MASTERFUL PROFANITY AND THE UNCONVINCING ASSEVERATIONS OF THE DEALER—AND OF THE ULTIMATE SATISFACTION OF BOTH PARTIES
The purchase of antiques in Italy, in order to be successful, must be attended with enormous amounts of subtlety, gesticulation, swearing, lying, and passion. The proceeding is, or should be somewhat as follows: