[Illustration: A Barber's Shop. From a Wood Engraving by J. Amman. 16th Century. Shewing a Chair of the time.]
In the chapter on Jacobean furniture, we shall see the influence and assistance which England derived from Flemish woodworkers; and the similarity of the treatment in both countries will be noticed in some of the South Kensington Museum specimens of English marqueterie, made at the end of the seventeenth century. The figure work in Holland has always been of a high order, and though as the seventeenth century advanced, this perhaps became less refined, the proportions have always been well preserved, and the attitudes are free and unconstrained.
A very characteristic article of seventeenth century Dutch furniture is the large and massive wardrobe, with the doors handsomely carved, not infrequently having three columns, one in the centre and one at each side, and these generally form part of the doors, which are also enriched with square panels, carved in the centre and finished with mouldings. There are specimens in the South Kensington Museum, of these and also of earlier Flemish work when the Renaissance was purer in style and, as has been observed, of less national character.
The marqueterie of this period is extremely rich, the designs are less severe, but the colouring of the woods is varied, and the effect heightened by the addition of small pieces of mother of pearl and ivory. Later, this marqueterie became florid, badly finished, and the colouring of the veneers crude and gaudy. Old pieces of plain mahogany furniture were decorated with a thin layer of highly coloured veneering, a meretricious ornamentation altogether lacking refinement.
There is, however, a peculiarity and character about some of the furniture of North Holland, in the towns of Alkmaar, Hoorn, and others in this district, which is worth noticing. The treatment has always been more primitive and quaint than in the Flemish cities to which allusion has been made--and it was here that the old farm houses of the Nord-Hollander were furnished with the rush-bottomed chairs, painted green; the three-legged tables, and dower chests painted in flowers and figures of a rude description, with the colouring chiefly green and bright red, is extremely effective.