This simple tabletop assemblage features several of John Frederick Peto’s favorite motifs: tattered books, crockery, and other junk-shop miscellany. Peto was part of the late 1800s American revival of the seventeenth-century Dutch trompe l’oeil style (trick of the eye) and animated his compositions through playful arrangements. Here, a book cover hanging from its threads and a candle teetering atop the edge of a pipe introduce an element of tension. Peto’s preference for such humble, everyday objects gave his work an especially populist appeal.