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Fig. 1535. Gothic suit

Made in Paris by Monsieur Leblanc-Granger

maker of armour to the Paris opera, who, like Charles Rouget, constructed harnesses on "Gothic" lines. They are so absurd in the forms they represent that it is hardly necessary to caution the amateur against them; but we are bound to confess that we have known cases in which such a suit has turned up in a country sale in a rusty and dirty condition, and has been sold and bought as the genuine thing. The productions of these two firms do not purport to be more than stage armour, good or bad, in proportion to the price paid; but it is only fair to say that the firm of Leblanc-Granger have turned out work of the kind which is of the very first order. About 1875 an artificer in Paris, by name Klein, made suits of armour of a so-called decorative nature. He also specialized in the restoration of armour and arms. Although a rough fellow he had much intelligence. Many of the suits to be seen in the Musée d'Artillerie display his handicraft. The fluted Maximilian armour of the transitional years of the XVth-XVIth centuries has always been sought for by the collector; for the robust proportions are very knightly in their appearance, and, in the past, fairly complete genuine harnesses were often met with. But, as may be imagined, the demand soon exceeded the supply; with the result that the artificers turned their attention to making copies, which were passed off as genuine. These suits are often to be seen in collections formed twenty to thirty years ago, about the period of their first manufacture; before that date it does not appear that these sham Maximilian harnesses were fabricated. In a well-known English