The graceful serpentine facade was taken directly from English furniture and may have evolved from the block-front. The facade on this diminutive chest of drawers probably represents its earliest incarnation, as it is flush with the chest’s sides and the serpentine is slightly indented—a configuration that also occurs on block-front and serpentine-bombé cases. The pleasing undulating contour persisted into the Neoclassical period, when price books reveal its expense as 50 percent greater than a bowed-front chest and double that of a straight-fronted one. An unusual feature on this example is the juxtaposition of bracket and ball-and-claw feet.

Technical notes: Mahogany; eastern white pine. The bottom is flush with the base molding. The top is secured by sliding dovetails. The hardware appears to be original. The drawers and base, exterior backboard, and the base are inscribed A. The base is also marked “x” and “Botom.”

Related examples:  Similar chests, but with ball-and-claw feet, are pictured in Sack 1950, p. 100; Antiques 143 (March 1993), p. 375; Antiques 152 (November 1997), p. 574; a bracket-footed example is illustrated in Randall 1965, pp. 36–37, no. 29. The juxtaposition of claw and bracket feet appears on a block-front desk and bookcase (Sack 1969–92, vol. 1, p. 85, no. 261) and two serpentine-front chests (Wood 1996, pp. 30–32, no. 12A), one labeled by Hartford cabinetmakers Samuel Kneeland (1755–1828) and Lemuel Adams (d. 1821) and dated 1793 (Ward and Hosley 1985, pp. 256–57). Another example, attributed to Samuel Sewall (1724–1814), York, Maine, is inspired by the Boston model and suggests the regional range (Kaye 1985, p. 276).

Book excerpt: David B. Warren, Michael K. Brown, Elizabeth Ann Coleman, and Emily Ballew Neff. American Decorative Arts and Paintings in the Bayou Bend Collection. Houston: Princeton Univ. Press, 1998.