panel of a door, to elaborate picture-making, in which landscapes, views
of churches, houses and picturesque ruins were copied, figures and animals
being also introduced. This work was naturally facilitated and encouraged
by increasing commerce between different nations, which rendered available
a greater variety of woods. In some of the early Italian "intarsia" the
decoration was cut into the surface of the panel piece by piece. As
artists became more skilful, veneers were applied and the effect
heightened by burning with hot sand the parts requiring shading; and the
lines caused by the thickness of the sawcuts were filled in with black
wood or stained glue to give definition to the design.

[Illustration: A Sixteenth Century "Coffre-Fort."]

The "mounting" of articles of furniture with metal enrichments doubtless
originated in the iron corner pieces and hinge plates, which were used to
strengthen the old chests, of which mention has been already made, and as
artificers began to render their productions decorative as well as useful,
what more natural progress than that the iron corners, bandings, or
fastenings, should be of ornamental forged or engraved iron. In the
sixteenth century, metal workers reached a point of excellence which has
never been surpassed, and those marvels of mountings in steel, iron and
brass were produced in Italy and Germany, which are far more important as
works of art, than the plain and unpretending productions of the coffer
maker, which are their _raison d'etre._ The woodcut on p. 53 represents a
very good example of a "Coffre-fort" in the South Kensington Collection.
The decoration is bitten in with acids so as to present the appearance of
its being damascened, and the complicated lock, shewn on the inside of the
lid, is characteristic of these safeguards for valuable documents at a
time when the modern burglar-proof safe had not been thought of.