and fluted, the
frieze having in the centre a plaque of _bronze dore_, the subject being a
group of cupids, representing the triumph of Poetry, and on each side a
scroll with a head and foliage (the only ornament characteristic of Louis
Quinze style) connecting leg and frieze. M. Williamson quotes verbatim the
memorandum of which this was the subject. It was made for the Trianon and
the date is just one year after Marie Antoinette's marriage:--"Memoire des
ouvrages faits et livres, par les ordres de Monsieur le Chevalier de
Fontanieu, pour le garde meuble du Roy par Riesener, ebeniste a l'arsenal
Paris," savoir Sept. 21, 1771; and then follows a fully detailed
description of the table, with its price, which was 6,000 francs, or L240.
There is a full page illustration of this table.

The maker of this piece of furniture was the same Riesener whose
masterpiece is the magnificent _Bureau du Roi_ which we have already
alluded to in the Louvre. This celebrated _ebeniste_ continued to work for
Marie Antoinette for about twenty years, until she quitted Versailles, and
he probably lived quite to the end of the century, for during the
Revolution we find that he served on the Special Commission appointed by
the National Convention to decide which works of Art should be retained
and which should be sold, out of the mass of treasure confiscated after
the deposition and execution of the King.

Riesener's designs do not show much fertility, but his work is highly
finished and elaborate. His method was generally to make the centre panel
of a commode front, or the frieze of a table, a _tour de force_, the
marqueterie picture being wonderfully delicate. The subject was generally
a vase with fruits and flowers; the surface of the side panels inlaid with
diamond-shaped lozenges, or a small diaper pattern in marqueterie; and
then a framework of rich ormolu would separate the panels. The centre
panel had sometimes a richer frame. His famous commode, made for the
Chateau of Fontainebleau, which cost a million francs (L4,000)--an
enormous sum in those days--is one of his _chefs d'oeuvre_, and this is an
excellent example of his style. A similar commode was sold in the Hamilton
Palace sale for L4,305. An upright secretaire, _en suite_ with the
commode, was also sold at the same time for L4,620, and the writing table
for L6,000. An illustration of the latter is on the following page, but
the details of this elaborate gem of cabinet maker's wor