Illustrations are given from some of the more notable examples of decorative furniture of this period, which were sold in 1882 at the celebrated Hamilton Palace sale, together with the sums they realised; also of specimens in the South Kensington Museum, in the Jones Collection.
We must also remember, in considering the meubles de luxe of this time, that in 1753 Louis XI. had made the Sêvres Porcelain Manufactory a State enterprise; and later, as that celebrated undertaking progressed, tables and cabinets were ornamented with plaques of the beautiful and choice páte tendre, the delicacy of which was admirably adapted to enrich the light and frivolous furnishing of the dainty boudoir of a Madame du Barri or a Madame Pompadour.
Another famous artist in the delicate bronze mountings of the day was Pierre Gouthière. He commenced work some years later than Caffieri, being born in 1740; and, like his senior fellow craftsman, did not confine his attention to furniture, but exercised his fertility of design, and his passion for detail, in mounting bowls and vases of jasper, of Sêvres and of Oriental porcelain. The character of his work is less forcible than that of Caffieri, and comes nearer to what we shall presently recognise as the Louis Seize or Marie Antoinette style, to which period his work more properly belongs. In careful finish of minute details, it more resembles the fine goldsmith's work of the Renaissance.
Gouthière was employed extensively by Madame du Barri; and at her execution, in 1793, he lost the enormous balance of 756,000 francs, which was due to him, but which debt the State repudiated, and the unfortunate man died in extreme poverty, the inmate of an almshouse.
The designs of the celebrated tapestry of Gobelins and of Beauvais, used for the covering of the finest furniture of this time, also underwent a change; and instead of the representation of the chase, with a bold and vigorous rendering, we find shepherds and shepherdesses, nymphs and satyrs, the illustrations of La Fontaine's fables or renderings of Boucher's pictures. The arm chair, or fauteuil, with upholstered instead of open sides, was introduced into the suite of tapestry furniture, and the term by which it is known, "chaise bergère," seems to be a sign of the fashion of the day.
Without doubt, the most important examples of meubles de luxe of this reign is the famous "Bureau du Roi," made for Louis XV. in 1769, and which is fully described in the inventory of the "Garde Meuble" in the year 1775, under No. 2541. The description is very minute, and is fully quoted by M. Williamson in his valuable work, "Les Meubles d'Art du Mobilier National," occupying in space no less than thirty-seven lines of printed matter. Its size is five and a half feet long and three feet deep; the lines are the perfection of grace and symmetry; the marqueterie is in Riesener's best manner; the mountings are magnificent—reclining figures, foliage, laurel wreaths, and swags, chased with rare skill. The back of this famous bureau is as fully decorated as the front: it is signed, "Riesener, f. e., 1769, á l'arsenal de Paris." Riesener is said to have received the order for this celebrated piece of furniture—of which a full-page illustration is given—from the King in 1767, upon the occasion of the marriage of this favourite Court ébeniste with the widow of his former master Oeben. Its production, therefore, would seem to have occupied about two years.
This celebrated chef d'œuvre was in the Tuileries in 1807, and was included in the inventory found in the cabinet of Napoleon I. It was moved by Napoleon III. to the Palace of St. Cloud, and was only saved from capture by the Germans by its removal to its present home in the Louvre in August, 1870. It is said that it would probably realise, if now offered for sale, between fifteen and twenty thousand pounds.
A similar bureau is in the Hertford Wallace collection, which was made to the order of Stanilaus, King of Poland; and a copy of it, executed by Zwiener, a very clever ébeniste of the present day in Paris, at a cost of some three thousand pounds, is in the same collection. Between the publishing of the third and fourth editions of this book, this valuable collection, under the will of the late Lady Wallace, passed into the possession of the English nation, and the fine specimens of furniture which it contains are now available for reference.
LOUIS XVI. AND MARIE ANTOINETTE.
It is probable that for some little time previous to the death of Louis XV., the influence of the beautiful daughter of Maria Theresa on the fashions of the day was manifested in furniture and its accessories. We know that Marie Antoinette disliked the pomp and ceremony of Court functions, and preferred a simpler way of living at the favourite farm house which was given to her husband as a residence, on his marriage, four years before his accession to the throne; and here she delighted to mix with the bourgeoisie on the terrace at Versailles, or donning a simple dress of white muslin, would busy herself in the garden or dairy. There was, doubtless, something of the affectation of a woman spoiled by admiration, in thus playing the rustic: still, one can understand that the best French society, weary of the domination of the late King's mistresses, with their intrigues, their extravagances, and their creatures, looked forward, at the death of Louis, with hope and anticipation to the accession of his grandson and the beautiful young queen.