Page:Southern Antiques - Burroughs - 1931.djvu/47

Rh  of living of the more wealthy British, and much of its splendor highly in keeping with the sumptuousness with which British nobility surrounded itself, was however, far too ornate for general practical purpose, and transitions of his designs were widely effected for those wishing something less elaborate. London cabinetmakers of his day were constantly at work on simpler interpretations of his designs, and the type that came to America was of this class. Pieces of Southern-made furniture found, after the Chippendale manner, while not as sophisticated as the English examples, have a great deal of charm.

Chippendale was distinctly felt below the Potomac, and his influence shows generally in the types extant today; cupboards, side tables, tables, cellarets, and chairs of course, fell under the dominance of his interest. With so much around them by way of example, men from London easily in touch with it, arriving constantly among them, the Southern craftsmen could do no other than to aspire to its beauty.

Much is to be said of the Chippendale chair: the influence of the Dutch in the understructure; the Queen Anne vase design, and the piercing of the splat; the ladder backs, the ribbands; fret work and interlaced effects; the intermingling of types; the oriental trellis and pagoda; the Gothic motifs; some of the chairs with square legs and understretchers, and some with cabriole and drop seat widening toward the front; the fine, top rail and its upward curving—all serve to make it what it is.

Among the chairs presented for examination, it has been made possible to show examples from 1760-1780 of the major types of the backs he employed. There is a fine old walnut armchair, showing the derivation of the fiddle-back; a Southern chair in mahogany, approaching in manner the ribband-back chair, although varied with a scroll and so faithful in detail as to appear almost a reproduction; a ladder-back, of mahogany, with sunk or hollowed seat, and a Chippendale side and corner chair, from an old mansion house in middle Virginia, reflecting the ideas of the great draftsman and designer, whose pencil, as he said, but faintly copied those images that his fancy suggested.

Tables of the period, in various designs, likewise reflected the Chippendale idea. This is evidenced in side tables in a variety of examples, and in three-section dining tables which were likewise employed.

A Chippendale table, showing the claw-and-ball foot will be later exemplified. There is a Chippendale walnut mixing table, 1760-1770, and the majority of cellarets show the Chippendale influence, and that of Hepplewhite, following after. This was the period of the pie-crust table; the first with raised rim, and the Pembroke table also appeared at this time.

The influence of Chippendale on the Southern cupboard reveals itself to fine effect in two different types. The side tables, too, show Chippendale designs, with one discovered particularly well worked out in fine detail. The Moravians made their appearance at Salem at the turn of the second half of the century, and the same Chippendale influence is felt in the furniture of the churchmen, furniture lovers finding much thrilling to them in