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Updated: June 27, 2025
This diminutive mansion was crammed with curios, specimens of china, of carved wood, of Japanese lacquer these much rarer than at present. It was a pleasant abode withal; a kindly, generous, happy-go-lucky spirit pervaded it. Few coming to seek help there were sent empty away, and the owner's earnest consideration was ready for all who sought her advice.
I was glad when Jessica came home to set up our little establishment and to join in the autumn gayeties. Brainard brought his wife to the city soon after, and went to housekeeping in an odd sort of a way. "I couldn't see anything in the place save curios," Jessica reported, after her first call on them. "I suppose there is a cookingstove somewhere, and maybe even a pantry with pots in it.
A what-not with semi-globular glass paperweights, enclosing miniature pictures of ships, New England rural snowstorms, and the like; sea-shells with Bible texts carved on them in cameo style; native curios; whale's tooth with full-rigged ship carved on it. There was nothing reminiscent of foreign parts, for nobody had been abroad.
During one of my sojourns in Paris, I met a Frenchman who, he informed me, had just returned from the East. I asked him if he had brought back any curios, such as vases, funeral urns, weapons, or amulets. "Yes, lots," he replied, "two cases full. But no mummies! Mon Dieu! No mummies! You ask me why? Ah! Therein hangs a tale. If you will have patience, I will tell it you."
Geoffrey's chief misgiving with regard to Japan had been a doubt as to the wisdom of making the acquaintance of his wife's kindred. How dreadful if they turned out to be a collection of oriental curios with whom he would not have one idea in common! The company of this young aristocrat, in no way distinguishable from an Englishman except for a certain grace and maturity, reassured him.
"'What's the hurry, says I. 'It was a square deal. And even if it was only an imitation of the original carving it'll take him some time to find it out. He seemed to be sure it was the genuine article. "'It was, says Andy. 'It was his own. When I was looking at his curios yesterday he stepped out of the room for a moment and I pocketed it. Now, will you pick up your suit case and hurry?
Perhaps among the most interesting of these curios are the little boxes of porcelain, enamelled wares, and wood, which were once used as "patch" boxes, and as receptacles for the pigments employed when gumming patches upon the cheeks and forehead was the height of fashion, and when painting the face was the rule rather than the exception.
Perhaps the earlier form likely to interest collectors of household curios is that made of perforated brass, often some 8 in. or 10 in. in depth. These fenders standing on claw feet were afterwards fitted with bottom plates of iron, on which was a ridge or rest against which the fire brasses were prevented from slipping.
Many of these classical examples that we accept as the right things to sing or play are hopelessly antiquated and out of date: they would not stand a chance as new compositions to-day. Antiquity itself is only a recommendation if we are collectors of curios.
Some years after we find Buckingham visiting Rubens at his home in Antwerp, dickering for his fine collection of curios and paintings. The Duke afterwards bought the collection and paid Rubens ten thousand pounds in gold for it.
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