[Illustration: _Hepplewhite, or Spade._] [Illustration: _Sheraton._] [Illustration: _English Empire._] [Illustration: _Pillar and Claw._] [Illustration: Figure 100. FEET.] The tapering fluted foot which we associate with Sheraton is also shown in Figure 100. Under his treatment it was nearly always decorated, either inlaid or carved, or sometimes both. Although we are most familiar with Sheraton style furniture in mahogany, he made much other furniture besides, as the following description of drawing-room chairs shows: "These drawing-room chairs are finished in white and gold, or the ornaments may be japanned, but the French finish them in mahogany with gilt mouldings. The figures in the tablets above the front rails are on French printed silk or satin, sewed onto the stuffing with borders round them. The seat and back are of the same kind, as is the ornamented tablet at the top of the chair. The top rail is pannelled, a small gold bead mitred round, and the printed silk pasted on. Chairs of this kind have an effect which far exceeds any conception we can have of them from an uncoloured engraving, or even a coloured one." This does not seem like the furniture we know as "Sheraton", yet in his books are many similar descriptions. After Sheraton gave up manufacturing furniture, and wrote only books of descriptions and patterns, France had passed through the throes of the Revolution, when the old _régime_ was swept away. Napoleon had been proclaimed First Consul, and then, in 1802, confirmed for life, and took under his charge even such minor details as furniture and dress. The styles arranged to suit his whim found an echo in England. The English Empire, both at its best and worse estate, could boast of nothing better than a feeble imitation of the antique, while the French Empire was at least an expression of the conquests and successes of one man. Thomas Hope was perhaps the best exponent of this style in England, and he industriously mingled emblems of the gods and goddesses, Phrygian caps and Roman fasces, Greek amphoræ, and fabulous animals on the furniture which he designed. In Figure 100 is shown one side of a chair designed by him, as also an Empire pillar-and-claw leg, as rendered by American cabinet-makers. Less ornate and ambitious, the American treatment of this period is preferable, for the chief use to which they put brass and bronze, the too-abundant use of which was so characteristic of this style, was to tip columns or pillars, and, to some extent, the feet of tables.