an almshouse.

The designs of the celebrated tapestry of Gobelins and of Beauvais, used
for the covering of the finest furniture of this time, also underwent a
change; and, instead of the representation of the chase, with a bold and
vigorous rendering, we find shepherds and shepherdesses, nymphs and
satyrs, the illustrations of La Fontaine's fables, or renderings of
Boucher's pictures.

Without doubt, the most important example of _meubles de luxe_ of this
reign is the famous "Bureau du Roi," made for Louis XV. in 1769, and which
appears fully described in the inventory of the "Garde Meuble" in the year
1775, under No. 2541. This description is very minute, and is fully quoted
by M. Williamson in his valuable work, "Les Meubles d'Art du Mobilier
National," and occupies no less than thirty-seven lines of printed matter.
Its size is five-and-a-half feet long and three feet deep; the lines are
the perfection of grace and symmetry; the marqueterie is in Riesner's best
manner; the mountings are magnificent--reclining figures, foliage, laurel
wreaths, and swags, chased with rare skill; the back of this famous bureau
is as fully decorated as the front: it is signed "Riesener, f.e., 1769, a
l'arsenal de Paris." Riesener is said to have received the order for this
bureau from the King in 1767, upon the occasion of the marriage of this
favourite Court _ebeniste_ with the widow of his former master Oeben. Its
production therefore would seem to have taken about two years.

This celebrated chef d'oeuvre was in the Tuileries in 1807, and was
included in the inventory found in the cabinet of Napoleon I. It was moved
by Napoleon III. to the Palace of St. Cloud, and only saved from capture
by the Germans by its removal to its present home in the Louvre, in
August, 1870. It is said that it would probably realise, if offered for
sale, between fifteen and twenty thousand pounds. A full-page illustration
of this famous piece of furniture is given.

A similar bureau is in the Hertford (Wallace) collection, which was made
to the order of Stanilaus, King of Poland; a copy executed by Zwiener, a
very clever _ebeniste_ of the present day in Paris, at a cost of some
three thousand pounds, is in the same collection.

Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette.

[Illustration: Boudoir Furnished in the Taste of the Louis XVI. Period.]

It is probable that for some little time previous to the death of Louis
XV., the influence of the beautiful daught