The age-herald., 1898-08-09
Women Who Collect BrIc-s.2rac.

HViHeil "hv yVheg! pTl0-s'eldV:
 The summer time is the lean season for the dealer in bric-a-brac. This is because the women are out of town, for 1t is by the might of the newly developed love for collecting antique, backed by the feminine dollar, that the keeper of the curiosity shop hhsss has hsss2me ;s the %3sstt pompous, prosperous tradesinaK on the block.
 ''It was the ultra fashionable women who went in for antiques and bric-a-brac first" said one dealer who does a whiring busL- ness in the winter. They and the actresses who grow rich are our most valued patrons and the shrewdest and most intelligent buy CTS, too, though, feminine-like they ex- hibit very marked eccentricities in select ing and purchasing. For example, it is rarely we find woman who interests her. self in more than one species of bric-a- brac at time. Then, too true to their sex, they dearly love to bargain, to hammer down the price of everything they buy to the lowest possible figure, and nine-tenths of our customers won't buy at all until they have had the article under discussion sent home, to try its effect among the re- mainder of their belongings. But the spe- ciaity system is what exerts the largest influence on the woman who treasures an- tiques-to be known and envied for having the finest collection of this that par ticular style of plate, for Vernis Martin or Sheraton furniture, for Fifteenth cen tury tapestries or Florentine carved oak Is the true goal of her ambition.
 Profitable customers they prove in the long run, the women are not on this very account easy to deal with. They are so apt to know whereof they buy; they are keen-eyed, incredulous, and among them ire recognized authorities every kind of oric-a-brac, who quick hawks for detecting the true from the false. Now when it comes to tapestries and French furniture of other days, a dealer must rise .arly in the morning to get ahead of Miss Hewett, the ex-mayor's daughter. She was )ne of the first women in New York to go In for this sort of thing, and in her two specialties her decision is valued as that of a professional expert. From an artistic and technical standpoint she knows pretty much all there is to know of the famous tapestries in this country and Europe, be- sides herself possessing one of the choicest collections in America, to which she adds from time to time.
 Next after Miss Hewett doubt if there is a woman for whom bric-a-brac dealers cherish deeper respect than Miss Elsie de Wolf. Years before the taste for sou venirs of other centuries was cultivated at all Miss de Wolf slowly and carefully gath cred up out of shops, in New York and Paris, bits of old French and Spanish paste, odd examples of gold and silver work in jewelry, combs, rings, buckles, etc., and then she added to this a really splendid array of fans.
 Her possession of seventeenth and eighteenth century paste alone could hard- ly be matched now outside of a European museum, and now that this ardor for col lecting has grown so earnest, the value of her array of antique jewelry has increased to the proportions of small fortune. rh. fntIt6 gladly exchange their diamo Id tiaras and necklaces for her ancient imitation stonas, but fine paste, though the things most de- sired by the feminine collectors today, Is the most diflA ksle to procure.
 .It ise..ssSs , . s.;ss.Srae Mne aealers eemss with fashionable friend to pass Juo5= ment on some piece of mahogany which the friend has under consideration, TOT Mrs. Belmont is one of the lew persons who can literally, when blindfolded, put her hands on piece 9f ths Tgg0s aId ana aood ,o or new and green. A part of her gifts from her parents at her marriage were wonderful sets of mahogany bedroom ana dining-room furniture taken from their oid home in the south. With this as starter, she began to buy good mahogany here and there. until the dealers in antiques. learning of this taste, fell into the way or sending her word when any special prize came into their hands. As a collector she is uniuue among women, for she never dis putes price, She prefers mahogany from the south, and after carefully exam ming a chair or table, passing her white hands caressingly over the wood, she puts down the first price named, or drops the whole matter then and there.
 Another equally intelligent and dehgnt- full collector from the dealers standpoint is Miss Maud Adams, whose taste IS ex- clusivelv for miniatures. Miss Adams IS not so well known to the trade, though as tall. gray-haired woman, who always looks over the last bits or old Enghsh plate one may have in, inquiries II any rei- ics of famous actresses have turned up, and who has all an Irish woman's genus for blarney when she wants to hammer down a set price. This Is Miss Ada Re- han. who has put thousands of dollars lh- to these two fads of hers. In England she has got together relics of the Siddohs Kitty Give, Wellington and Rachel that are worthy of a place in museum. ana her collection of plate fairly overfoWs both her New York and English homes.
 "A strange development has come aoou. !, ,n our trade since women have cultivated taste for bric-a-br Prior to this new interest of theirs we never had employed women as travelling buyers for us through tbe country. but in the south and New Irnpland. whence our best stock comes'