A friend of mine who is a great and discriminating collector of all sorts of antiquities, the Hon. Gerald Ponsonby, some years ago discovered, in Dublin, a set of what are known as “furniture supports,” which are extremely rarely to be met with. They were never general all over the kingdom, and, to the best of my belief, were confined to the South of England. There are four of these supports, which are formed of Staffordshire pottery. The face of one of them is believed to be intended to represent Sir Robert Peel. The coat is scarlet with a black stock; the hair and whiskers are brown; the eyes black, and the eyebrows black also; the cheeks are a vivid red; whilst the stand itself is of a deep mottled pink. The base is 2-7/8 inches in length by 2 inches in width, and it is 2-1/4 inches in height. The height from where the head begins, taken over the nose to the base, is 4½ inches, the circumference immediately under the chin being 8 inches. These supports were used to stand chests of drawers upon, so that when cottage floors were washed the bright woodwork of the legs should not be spoilt. The legs of the chest of drawers were placed upon the stand at the back of the head, the face of the support being outwards. The old four-posters which were once absolutely discarded and considered fit for nothing but the lumber-room or the wood-heap have now once more come into fashion, being eagerly sought for by collectors in old-world villages and country towns. When thoroughly cleaned and put into good order, with the addition of a modern spring mattress, they make by no means an unattractive couch. As a rule those four-posters are low, for people had low bedrooms in old days. In many of them the woodwork above the shelf at the head of the bed is a good deal charred—this is the result of burning by the candles placed there by their former occupants, who would seem to have been very careless as to fire. A great many oak bedsteads have very thick pillars at the foot, the bases of which in some cases resemble the legs of the old dining-tables, which were in most cases relegated to outhouses and attics about the time of the downfall of the Stuarts. These tables were in many cases adorned with some slight degree of inlaid work, and could be lengthened by pulling out flaps at each end. At the particular period when these tables were in use, furniture was not very abundant in English houses, but what there was of it was very useful and solid, elaborate ornamentation being principally confined to the chairs, specimens of which may still sometimes be found in out-of-the-way villages. Authentic pieces of Jacobean furniture of oak of English growth and of somewhat severe design may generally be recognised by its colour, which is something quite different from the dull black surface of modern imitations. Its patina, indeed, if such a word can be applied to furniture, is one which time alone can give, and this not even the most skilled manipulator can copy.