To Messrs. A. B. Daniell & Sons I am indebted for photographs of specimens in their galleries. In presenting this volume it is my intention that it should be a companion volume to my "Chats on Old Furniture," which records the history and evolution of the finer styles of English furniture, showing the various foreign influences on English craftsmen who made furniture for the wealthy classes. ARTHUR HAYDEN. CONTENTS CHAPTER I PAGE INTRODUCTORY NOTE 25 The minor collector--The originality of the village cabinet-maker--His freedom from foreign influences--The traditional character of his work--Difficult to establish dates to cottage and farmhouse furniture--Oak the chief wood employed--Beech, elm, and ash used in lieu of mahogany and satinwood--Village craftsmanship not debased by early-Victorian art--Its obliteration in the age of factory-made furniture--The conservation of old farmhouses with their furniture in Sweden and in Denmark--The need for the preservation and exhibition of old cottages and farmhouses in Great Britain. CHAPTER II SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY STYLES 43 Typical Jacobean furniture--Solidity of English joiners' work--Oak general in its use--The oak forests of England--Sturdy independence of country furniture--Chests of drawers--The slow assimilation of foreign styles--The changing habits of the people. CHAPTER III THE GATE-LEG TABLE 83 Its early form--Transitional and experimental stages--Its establishment as a permanent popular type--The gate-leg table in the Jacobean period--Walnut and mahogany varieties--Its utility and beauty contribute to its long survival--Its adoption in modern days. CHAPTER IV THE FARMHOUSE DRESSER 113 The days of the late Stuarts--Its early table form with drawers--The decorated type with shelves--William and Mary style with double cupboards--The Queen Anne cabriole leg--Mid-eighteenth-century types. CHAPTER V THE BIBLE-BOX, THE CRADLE, THE SPINNING-WHEEL, AND THE BACON-CUPBOARD 137 The Puritan days of the seventeenth century--The Protestant Bible in every home--The variety of carving found in Bible-boxes--The Jacobean cradle and its forms--The spinning-wheel--The bacon-cupboard. CHAPTER VI EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY STYLES 155 The advent of the cabriole leg--The so-called Queen Anne style--The survival of oak in the provinces--The influence of walnut on cabinet-making--The early-Georgian types--Chippendale and his contemporaries. CHAPTER VII