Until the middle of the seventeenth century, Flanders may be said to have overshadowed Holland in the field of Decorative Art, although, as we have seen, the two most important designers of domestic furniture—De Vries and Crispin van de Passe—were Dutch. The reason of Flemish preponderance was that the sovereigns and regents resided at Mechlin, Ghent, Brussels and Antwerp, and to those courts the ablest men in the arts and crafts naturally flocked. With the decay of Antwerp, we enter the period of the Flemish Decadence, and Amsterdam rises to wealth and power at her rival’s expense. After the death of Rubens, Dutch art is supreme in the Low Countries; and Dutch taste undoubtedly influenced France and England. The Dutch home of the seventeenth century was profoundly affected by foreign trade. The day of heavy carved furniture was over lightness and brightness are now the prevailing notes. Broad surfaces are veneered and inlaid with exotic woods; and the lathe is freely used in the ornamentation of the supports of seats, cupboards, cabinets, etc. Above all, we notice a predominance of native and Oriental ceramic ware. The Dutch were as fond of earthenware as of tulips; and no study of a Dutch interior could be adequate if it neglected to take into account the part played by Delft and porcelain. The three novelties that impressed the Dutch home of the seventeenth century were tea, porcelain and lacquer. The importance of tea, with its table and equipage as a domestic altar, can hardly be overestimated; but its consideration may be deferred for the moment. Porcelain affected the arrangement of furniture and the decoration of rooms. The cabinet assumed new forms and proportions, as porcelain decorated its exterior. Although Chinese porcelains had appeared in the cabinets of amateurs of the sixteenth century, the comparative rarity of this ware confined its enjoyment to the very wealthy. The magnificent ebony cabinets, _armoires_, or _kasten_, with drawers and interior shelves in which women delighted to set in beautiful order miniatures and jewels, enamels and ivories, shells and rock-crystals, medals and coral, now had also to find room for carved ivory and ebony, gods and monsters, jade, porcelain, sandal-wood and lacquer boxes, and all the rarities that were to be found in the stores of the Eastern traders.