[Illustration: Fig. 97.--A Bishop’s Crozier, which appears to be of Italian manufacture. (Fourteenth Century. Cathedral of Metz.)] Between the enamels partitioned (_cloisonnés_) and the enamels _champlevés_ the difference, as we can see, is only the first arrangement of the divisions to receive the several vitrifiable compositions. Making allowances for the influence of fashion, these two styles of analogous works were held in almost equal estimation. Nevertheless, it seems that the preference ought to be assigned to the goldsmith’s art in Limoges, which, at a time when there was manifested a demand for private reliquaries and collective offerings to the churches, had this advantage over the other, that it was much less costly, and consequently more accessible to all classes (Fig. 96). In the present day there is scarcely a museum, or even a private collection, that does not contain some specimen of the ancient Limousine[15] industry. With the fourteenth century the splendour of the goldsmith’s art ceases to display, as its exclusive object, ecclesiastical decoration and embellishment; but it suddenly became so developed among the laity that King John (of France) desiring, or pretending to desire, to restore it to the exclusive line it had till then retained, prohibited by an ordinance, in 1356, the goldsmiths from “_working_ (fabricating) gold or silver plate, vases, or silver jewellery, of more than one mark of gold or silver, excepting for the churches.” But it is possible to issue ordinances in order to show the advantage of evading them, and to benefit exclusively by the exception. This is what appears to have then occurred; for, in the inventory of the treasury of Charles V., son and successor of the king who signed the sumptuary edict of 1356, the value of the various objects of the goldsmith’s art is estimated at not less than nineteen millions. This document, in which the greater number of the articles are described to the minutest detail, would suffice in itself to exhibit a truthful historical view of the art at that period; and, at all events, it affords a striking idea of the artistic progress made in that direction, and of the extravagance to which the trade was subservient. When considering the subject of furniture in domestic life, we indicated the names and the uses of several articles which were displayed on the tables or sideboards--plateholders, ewers, urns, goblets, &c.; we also adverted to the numerous and capricious forms they assumed--flowers, animals, grotesque images; we need not, therefore, recur to the matter; but we ought not to overlook the jewellery, of all sorts--insignia, or ornaments of the head-dress, gems, clasps, chains and necklaces, antique cameos (Fig. 98), which appear in the treasury of the King of France.