The width is taken at the middle of each of the three sections. The base of the plinth and the cornices of the head section should each measure 2 ft. 1 in. in width.
CHAPTER VIII: LACQUERED FURNITURE
English lacquered furniture "in the Oriental taste" belongs to the last quarter of the seventeenth and the first half of the eighteenth centuries. It is not surprising that when the rage for everything Chinese and Japanese—at the time indiscriminately called "Indian"—was prevalent, a school of Anglo-Oriental craftsmen should have sprung up. The taste was at its height about 1710, and continued for many years.
The art of lacquering is said by the Japanese themselves to have been practised in Japan as early as the third century, when the Empress Jingo conquered Corea. In the ninth century the Kioto artists inlaid their lacquer with mother-of-pearl. In the fifteenth century landscape decorations were used, and by the end of the seventeenth century the art had reached its zenith. The material used in Japan is resin-lac, an exudation from the lacquer-tree (Rhus vernicifera). Without going into the details of the art, it is well to bear in mind that the brilliant surface of Japanese lacquer is not obtained by varnishing, but by the actual polishing of the lacquer itself. It is treated as a solid body, built up stage by stage and polished at every stage. For an exposition of the art one cannot do better than read Mr. Marcus B. Huish's chapter on lacquer in "Japan and Its Art."
It was probably not till late Tudor times that any specimens of Japanese or Chinese lacquer found their way to this country, and then principally in the shape of small cups, bowls, and trays. "Indian Cabinets" are mentioned occasionally in inventories at the end of Elizabeth's reign, and in the household accounts of Charles II. there is an item of £100 for "two Jappan Cabinets."
The English and Portuguese traded with Japan in Elizabeth's reign, but were expelled in 1637. The Dutch were more tenacious, and from the commencement of their trading operations with Japan, in 1600, managed, at intervals, to keep in touch with their new market. Even the Dutch were regarded unfavourably by the Japanese authorities, and traded under considerable disabilities. The majority of the lacquered ware which came to England filtered through Holland. It was brought to Europe round the Cape in the armed Dutch merchantmen which, at the same time, were bringing home the beautiful old Imari vases and dishes with kinrande (brocade) decorations, which served later on as the models for the early Crown Derby "Old Japan" wares and the simple Kakiyemon specimens copied at Chelsea, Bow, and Dresden. One of these old ships, the Middleburg, trading from the China Seas, homeward bound and laden with bullion and curios, went down in Soldanha Bay, off the South African coast, on October 18, 1714. In August 1907 the divers salvaged some of the cargo. Needless to say, the "Jappan Cabinets" had long since perished, but the little Chinese blue-and-white cups and saucers came to the surface none the worse for nearly two hundred years' immersion in salt water.
We are fortunate in still possessing at Hampton Court Palace a goodly number of Kakiyemon hexagonal covered jars and bottle-shaped vases, and tall cylindrical Chinese blue-and-white vases of the Khang Hi reign, placed there by William and Mary; but the scarcity of contemporary English furniture there is deplorable. The real beauty of old Oriental porcelain is never so apparent as when displayed on the old "Jappan Cabinets" or the sombre furniture of the Orange-Nassau dynasty.
It was fashionable to decry the craze for things Chinese, and early eighteenth-century literature teems with gibes at the china maniacs of the day. We have referred in the first chapter of the volume to Macaulay's small opinion of the merits of old Chinese porcelain. The Spectator for February 12, 1712, contains a letter from an imaginary Jack Anvil who had made a fortune, married a lady of quality, and grown into Sir John Enville. He tells how my Lady Mary Enville "next set herself to reform every room in my house, having glazed all my chimney-pieces with looking glasses, and planted every corner with such heaps of China, that I am obliged to move about my own house with the greatest caution and circumspection for fear of hurting some of our brittle furniture."