The Art of Collecting Household Furniture 
THE ART OF COLLECTING 
HOUSEHOLD FURNITURE. 
F ASCINATING and not altogether un¬ 
profitable is the pursuit of the antique 
and the picturesque in household furniture. 
Perhaps this species of chase is even more 
interesting if the devotee of the sport is 
somewhat hampered by the limitations of a 
not over-lull pocketbook. He who spends 
freely does not derive so much pleasure from 
a fit or beautiful thing obtained at moderate 
price, as does he to 
whom every such in¬ 
dulgence is a luxury 
to be carefully weighed 
and considered. The 
cautious buyer soon 
learns that no piece of 
furniture is worth his 
ill-spared cash merely 
because it is old. He 
is fastidious, not only 
as to price, but also as 
to form and quality. 
Ourancestors put good 
material and skilled 
cabinet-making into 
some of the ugliest 
articles that ever disfig¬ 
ured a drawing-room. 
These the buyer of 
moderate means may 
very well leave for 
persons of more wealth 
t h a n taste. H e will 
watch tor delicate lines, 
quiet ornamentation 
and excellent work¬ 
manship. All these 
things may be had at 
moderate price, if the 
buyer knows where to search and how to bide 
his time. They are not to be had, save at 
relatively high prices, in the shops of the 
professional dealers in antiques in our largest 
cities, but rather in the junk-shops and 
obscure second-hand furniture stores, and 
occasionally at sales of household effects in 
the country. 
He that would meet rare opportunities 
must always have his eyes open, and must 
be content now and then to give a half¬ 
UNMATCHED CANDLESTICKS 
holiday to the search. The most knowing 
of the dealers in second-hand furniture have 
regular customers for whom they save any¬ 
thing excellent that comes into their hands. 
Others instantly expose upon the sidewalk 
any bit of mahogany or rosewood that they 
may chance upon. In such cases the bargain 
is for the first-comer. Still others ignorantly 
stow away fine old pieces with odds and ends 
of rubbish. It is to shops of this kind that 
one must look, and the intelligent collector 
will have half a dozen of them on his list to 
be visited at intervals 
ot three or four weeks. 
There is always a 
pleasant glow of antici¬ 
pation in the prospect 
of these visits. 
Bits of furniture 
picked up in this 
fashion give a peculiar 
interest to a house. To 
every article a story is 
attached. "The owner 
recalls the glow with 
which he came upon 
that delicate Chippen¬ 
dale sideboard, a mere 
wreck in an obscure 
shop, the ridiculously 
small price he paid 
for it, the satisfaction 
with which he installed 
it in his dining-room. 
Athingof beauty it now 
is, after the cabinet¬ 
maker has restored it 
to its pristine glory. 
That handsome 
■ mahogany arm chair, 
Greek in shape, and 
too heavy to be lifted 
by any but a strong arm, was bought for half a 
dollar, as the purchaser was hurrying to catch 
a railway train. That rosewood card-table 
was found beneath the rubbish of a second¬ 
hand furniture dealer’s shop in a suburban 
city, bought for less than five dollars and 
repaired for six. "That pair of old-fashioned 
candlesticks, with jingling crystal ornaments, 
was bought in a like place for a dollar and 
a hall, when nearly half the prisms were 
missing. Those two graceful brass candle- 
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