e. Thomas Coryate, a noted
traveller, is said to have introduced them into Germany, and afterwards
into England, where their use was at first much ridiculed as effeminate,
the "fork-carving" traveller being spoken of in contempt.

Forks were in regular use in England early in the sixteenth century.
Dean Stanley, in his _Memorials of Westminster Abbey_, quotes from the
Chapter Book of 1554, in which it is stated by Dean Weston (1553-6) that
the College dinners "became somewhat disorderly, _forks_ and knives were
tossed freely to and fro." The old table forks were two-pronged, the
prongs being long and set near together; the steel forks of the early
nineteenth century were three-pronged, and another prong was added
later, the latter form being adapted by the makers of silver forks in
more recent years.

In Fig. 18 is shown a very handsome knife case and its contents, which
are to be seen in the Victoria and Albert Museum. In Fig. 19 another
example of a set of knife, fork, and spoon in the same collection is
illustrated.

The spoon is, like the knife, of great antiquity. It is said to have
been suggested by shells on the shore, and by the hollow of the hand
which in the most primitive days was used to drink with. The most
beautiful old spoons are those made of silver, a magnificent pair being
shown in Fig. 20. Many such spoons are now almost priceless, especially
the much-valued Apostle spoons, often given in olden time as christening
gifts. Silver spoons more correctly belong to antique silver, which
forms another branch of curio-collecting.

Of spoons there are many made of other materials than silver, some being
carved in wood (see Chapter XIII), others of ivory, and some of bone.
Many of the older spoons were made of brass or latten; but when silver
became popular table spoons of silver were procured whenever it was
possible to afford them, and a collection including in the varieties the
Apostle and the seal top, and its various developments from the rat-tail
to the fiddle, is obtainable. As regarding spoons Westman has written:
"The spoon is one of the first things wanted when we come into the
world, and it is one of the last things we part with before we go out."

[Illustration: FIG. 19.--KNIFE, FORK, AND SPOON.

(_In the Victoria and Albert Museum._)]

The collector revels in the beautifully engraved blades of the rarer
curios; in the handles so varied in their materials and ornament; and in
the cases in wh