CHAPTER X FURNITURE OF THE EIGHTEENTH AND NINETEENTH CENTURIES Lacquer—Oriental Methods—European Importations and Limitations—Prices— An Ambassador’s Report—_Singerie_, _Chinoiserie_ and _Rocaille_— The Dutch Decadence—Interiors of Cornelis Troost—Mirrors—Wealth and Luxury of Dutch Merchants—Court Contrast—Tapestry—Brussels as a Centre of Art and Luxury—Eighteenth Century Furniture—The Empire Style in the Low Countries—Dutch Homes of the Nineteenth Century— The Maarken House and Furniture—Typical Farmhouse and Furniture— Country Seats and Town Houses—Hindeloopen Houses and Furniture—A Friesland House—Canal Boat Furniture—Dutch Love of Symmetry— Collectors and Collections. So far little attention has been paid in these pages to lacquer, though important articles of household furniture that owed their beauty and value to this species of ornamentation have appeared in inventories and diaries under the designation of “vernish,” “japan” or “japanned.” Sometimes this work was referred to as “black” merely, as in the case of John Hervey’s “dear wife’s” boudoir. The Oriental method of lacquering requires a vast amount of patience and skill. After the wood has been smoothly planed, it is covered with a thin sheet of paper or silk gauze. Over this is spread a thick coating of buffalo’s gall and powdered red sandstone. When dry, this is rubbed with wax and polished, or washed over with gum and chalk. The varnish is laid on with a flat brush. The article is now thoroughly dried, and again moistened and polished with a piece of soft slate, or the stalks of a special grass. The workman then repeats the process, giving it a second coating of lacquer, and again dries and polishes it. Sometimes as many as eighteen or twenty coatings are applied, but never less than three. The lacquer used by the Chinese and Japanese is derived from the juice of the “varnish tree.” This juice, a natural secretion, is acrid, and soon hardens into a black resin. To obtain it, pieces of bamboo are inserted into the bark and allowed to remain all night, for the juice flows more freely at night than during the day. This is boiled with equal parts of oil obtained from the fruit of the _mimusops elengi_. The chief trees that yield this gum are the black varnish tree (_melanorrhoea usitata_) and the Japan varnish tree (_rhus vernicifera_). There are grades in lacquer. Lacquer on a gold ground is the most highly prized; and the first examples of this kind that reached Europe were gifts to Dutch officials from Japanese princes. This sort of lacquer is seldom found on furniture, with the exception of delicate little boxes and occasionally plaques that were inserted into furniture.