e
inheritor of their functions than the modern sideboard, which, as we
know it, is practically an 18th-century invention. It developed into its
present shape about the second quarter of the 17th century, and has
since then changed but little. As a piece of movable furniture it was
made rarely, if at all, after the beginning of the 19th century until
the revival of interest in what is called "farmhouse furniture" at the
very beginning of the 20th century led in the first place to the
construction of many imitation antique dressers from derelict pieces of
old oak, and especially from panels of chests, and in the second to the
making of avowed imitations. The dresser conformed to a model which
varied only in detail and in ornament. Its simple and agreeable form
consisted of a long and rather narrow table or slab, with drawers or
cupboards beneath and a tall upright closed-in back arranged with a
varying number of shallow shelves for the reception of plates; hooks for
mugs were often fixed upon the face of these shelves. Towards the end of
the 17th century small cupboards were often added to the superstructure.
The majority of these dressers were made of oak, but when, early in the
Georgian period mahogany came into general use, they were frequently
inlaid with that wood; holly and box were also used for inlaying, most
frequently in the shape of plain bands or lines. A peculiarly effective
combination of oak and mahogany is found in the dressers, as in other
"farmhouse furniture," made on the borders of Staffordshire and
Shropshire. The excellence of the work of this kind in that district and
in the country lying west of it may perhaps explain the expression
"Welsh dresser," which is now no more than a trade term, not necessarily
suggestive of the place of origin, and applied to all dressers of this
type. They are most frequently found in the houses of small yeomen and
substantial farmers, into which fashion penetrated slowly. The dresser
is now most familiar as necessary plenishing of the kitchen, in which it
is invariably a fixture. In form it is essentially identical with the
movable variety, but it is usually much larger, is made of deal or other
soft wood, and the superstructure has no back.

DREUX, a town of north-western France, capital of an arrondissement in
the department of Eure-et-Loir, 27 m. N.N.W. of Chartres by rail. Pop.
(1906) 8209. It is situated on the Blaise, which at this point divides
into severa