carried on a
large and successful business in St. Martin's Lane, which was at this time
an important Art centre, and close to the newly-founded Royal Academy.

[Illustration: English Satinwood Dressing Table. With Painted Decoration.
End of XVIII. Century.]

[Illustration: Chimneypiece and Overmantel. Designed by W. Thomas,
Architect. 1783. Very similar to Robert Adam's work.]

Chippendale published "The Gentleman and Cabinet Maker's Director," not,
as stated in the introduction to the catalogue to the South Kensington
Museum, in 1769, but some years previously, as is testified by a copy of
the "third edition" of the work which is in the writer's possession and
bears date 1762, the first edition having appeared in 1754. The title page
of this edition is reproduced in _fac simile_ on page 178.

[Illustration: Chairs, With ornament in the Chinese style, by Thomas
Chippendale.]

This valuable work of reference contains over two hundred copperplate
engravings of chairs, sofas, bedsteads, mirror frames, girandoles,
torcheres or lamp stands, dressing tables, cabinets, chimney pieces,
organs, jardinieres, console tables, brackets, and other useful and
decorative articles, of which some examples are given. It will be observed
from these, that the designs of Chippendale are very different from those
popularly ascribed to him. Indeed, it would appear that this maker has
become better known than any other, from the fact of the designs in his
book being recently republished in various forms; his popularity has thus
been revived, while the names of his contemporaries are forgotten. For the
last fifteen or twenty years, therefore, during which time the fashion has
obtained of collecting the furniture of a bygone century, almost every
cabinet, table, or mirror-frame, presumably of English manufacture, which
is slightly removed from the ordinary type of domestic furniture, has
been, for want of a better title, called "Chippendale." As a matter of
fact, he appears to have adopted from Chambers the fanciful Chinese
ornament, and the rococo style of that time, which was superseded some
five-and-twenty years later by the quieter and more classic designs of
Adam and his contemporaries.

[Illustration: _Fac-Simile of the Title Page of Chippendale's "Director."
(Reduced by Photography.) The Original is in Folio Size_.

THE
GENTLEMAN and CABINET-MAKER'S
DIRECTOR:
Being a large COLLECTION of the
Most ELEGANT and U