The Queen has also amongst her numerous Jubilee presents some very handsome ivory furniture of Indian workmanship, which may be seen at Windsor Castle.  These, however, as well as the Jones Collection examples, though thoroughly Indian in character as regards the treatment of scrolls, flowers, and foliage, shew unmistakcably the influence of French taste in their general form and contour.  Articles, such as boxes, stands for gongs, etc., are to be found carved in sandal wood, and in dalburgia, or black wood, with rosewood mouldings; and a peculiar characteristic of this Indian decoration, sometimes applied to such small articles of furniture, is the coating of the surface of the wood with red lacquer, the plain parts taking a high polish while the carved enrichment remains dull.  The effect of this is precisely that of the article being made of red sealing wax, and frequently the minute pattern of the carved ornament and its general treatment tend to give an idea of an impression made in the wax by an elaborately cut die.  The casket illustrated on p. 134 is an example of this treatment.  It was exhibited in 1851.

The larger examples of Indian carved woodwork are of teak; the finest and most characteristic specimens within the writer’s knowledge are the two folding doors which were sent as a present to the Indian Government, and are in the Indian Museum.  They are of seventeenth century work, and are said to have enclosed a library at Kerowlee.  While the door frames are of teak, with the outer frames carved with bands of foliage in high relief, the doors themselves are divided into panels of fantastic shapes, and yet so arranged that there is just sufficient regularity to please the eye.  Some of these panels are carved and enriched with ivory flowers, others have a rosette of carved ivory in the centre, and pieces of talc with green and red colour underneath, a decoration also found in some Arabian work.  It is almost impossible to convey by words an adequate description of these doors; they should be carefully examined as examples of genuine native design and workmanship.  Mr. Pollen has concluded a somewhat detailed account of them by saying:—­“For elegance of shape and proportion, and the propriety of the composition of the frame and sub-divisions of these doors, their mouldings and their panel carvings and ornaments, we can for the present name no other example so instructive.  We are much reminded by this decoration of the pierced lattices at the S. Marco in Venice.”

[Illustration:  Casket of Indian Lacquer Work.]

There is in the Indian Museum another remarkable specimen of native furniture—­namely, a chair of the purest beaten gold of octagonal shape, and formed of two bowls reversed, decorated with acanthus and lotus in repousee ornament.  This is of eighteenth century workmanship, and was formerly the property of Runjeet Sing.  The precious metal is thinly laid on, according to the Eastern method, the wood underneath the gold taking all the weight.