Of all the goldsmiths of the time the best known is Gilles Légaré of Chaumont-en-Bassigny, who was jeweller to Louis XIV, and worked in Paris about 1663. His series of designs, entitled _Livre des Ouvrages d'Orfévrerie_, is perhaps the most interesting of the kind produced during the seventeenth century. These fine compositions, when formed of precious stones, show knots and interlacings for clasps, pendants, and earrings, in which diamonds are fully displayed in rose-cut forms. As models for objects not composed entirely of stones, we find seals, rings, bracelets and chains decorated with ribbons and bows mingled with monograms, and emblems, such as death's-heads. Together with these appear tasteful arrangements for enamel-work in the form of natural flowers of great charm and delicacy. To these last reference will be made later. Contemporary with Légaré was the painter and engraver Balthazar Moncornet, who worked at Rouen and Paris. His book of designs, of which he was probably the inventor as well as engraver, entitled _Livre nouveau de toutes sortes d'ouvrages d'orfévries,_ was published about 1670[173]. The jewels, in the form of pendants, earrings, and brooches, are composed of stones set in various ways; the last plate is a miniature portrait of Louis XIV set as a brooch. All his designs are accompanied by garlands of natural flowers. [173] Reproduced by Quaritch in 1888. [Illustration: _PLATE XL_ DESIGNS FOR JEWELLERY BY GILLES LÉGARÉ AND PAUL BIRCKENHULTZ] Complete as was the change which was brought about owing to the prominence given to the precious stone, it must not be supposed that the enameller's art was by any means neglected. Though it cannot be compared with that in the best productions of the Renaissance, the enamel-work applied to seventeenth-century jewellery is, nevertheless, worthy of close attention. Enamel executed by the champlevé method was much employed. The technical process known as champlevé was performed in two ways. By one method the surface of the gold was simply incised with designs, and the grooves thus made filled with enamel. By another method only thin lines of the metal were reserved to form the design, and the remainder of the field cut out to receive the enamel. This latter system resembles in appearance the well-known cloisonné; but the metal strips that form the partitions between the enamel, instead of being inserted, are a solid part of the metal base. Commonly employed on jewellery from the middle of the sixteenth century, it remained in general favour, together with the simpler form of champlevé, till about the third decade of the seventeenth century, when it gave place to enamel-work of an entirely different kind.