Furniture of the Olden Time

by Frances Clary Morse

Illus. 364.—Looking-glass,
1690.

Looking-glasses of large size were made in two sections, the lower piece with the edge bevelled and lapped over the plain upper piece. This was to avoid the tax upon glass beyond a certain size.

The fashion for japanning or lacquering which obtained vogue at the close of the seventeenth century was followed in looking-glass frames. A London newspaper of 1689 thus advertised: “Several sorts of Screwtores, Tables, Stands and Looking-glasses of Japan and other work.”

Illustration [363] shows a looking-glass in a japanned frame, owned by Dwight M. Prouty, Esq., of Boston. The wood of the frame is walnut, and it is covered with lacquer in gold and colors. The shape of the frame around the glass is followed by the bevel, and the lower piece of glass laps over the upper.

Illustration [364] shows the top section of a looking-glass with a lacquered frame. In this case the frame was made in sections, the lower section being lost. The curves in the frame are followed in the glass by the old shallow bevelling over an inch in width, and a star is cut in the middle of the glass. The frame is elaborately japanned with gold and bright colors, and is twenty-six inches in height, showing that the looking-glass, when whole, was of generous size. The design of the sawed edge is of a very early style. The glass is owned by the American Antiquarian Society, of Worcester.

The looking-glass at the head of this chapter is owned by E. R. Lemon, Esq., of the Wayside Inn. It is of walnut veneer, and the old bevelled glass is in two sections, the upper one cut in a design, and with the lower edge lapped over the other piece of glass. Another glass of the same period, the first quarter of the eighteenth century, owned by Mr. Lemon, heads Chapter XI. This frame has a top ornament of a piece of walnut sawed in curves which suggest those upon later frames.

Such a looking-glass as this was probably what Judge Sewall meant when he sent for “A True Looking Glass of Black Walnut Frame of the Newest Fashion (if the Fashion be good) as good as can be bought for five or six pounds.” This was for wedding furniture for the judge’s daughter Judith, married in 1720.