CHAP. xxiv. USE OF GOLD AND SILVER.

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sented to the Duke of Marlborough may havestimulated the more opulent part of the nobilityand such public bodies as were possessed of wealthto attempt to imitate, if not to rival, the splendiddecorations of the heroic and successful general.However that may be, it seems that the mass ofold silver and gold articles of furniture still re-maining in its ancient form is of the fabricationof that reign. This is the case with the plateof the Duke of Devonshire, and of other distin-guished families, as well as of that belonging tothe Goldsmiths’ Company of London and to otherpublic bodies.

The introduction of tea, but especially the ex-tension which it gradually received, till it has be-come the daily fare of almost the whole com-munity, had an influence on the consumption ofsilver for small spoons. They were scarcelyknown in the previous reign, but multiplied inthe reign of Anne, and have gone on increasingfrom that time to the present, when they maybe counted by millions, perhaps by hundreds ofmillions.

Between the reign of Anne and the latter endof that of George the second, the progress of theapplication of silver and gold was at a slower pace ;but between 1760 and 1770 a fresh impulse seemsto have been given, which has continued up to thepresent time, though with some variations in itsrapidity. When table-spoons of silver had super-