that simple instrument, man; and, in the course of a friendly conversation, persuaded Mr. Lapham to have the entrance-story low-studded, with a little reception-room beside the door; to use the whole width of the house frontage for a square hall, with an easy, low-tread staircase, running up three sides of it; to paint the drawing-room white, introducing a little gold here and there, with, perhaps, a painted frieze under the cornice-garlands of roses on a gold ground -and a white-marble chimney-piece, treated in the refined empire style. Lapham "respected a fellow who could beat him at every point, and have a reason ready, as this architect had; and when he recovered from the daze into which the complete upheaval of all his preconceived notions had left him, he was in a fit state to swear by the architect." The most brilliant American example of the possible influence of the architect over his client, was the late Mr. H. H. Richardson, a characteristic specimen of whose genius is seen in the illustration (p. 363) of the lodge of Mr. Frederick L. Ames's house at North Easton, Mass. For parlors and bedrooms, the most fashionable style of decoration is Louis XVI; there are two French establishments on Fifth Avenue, New York city, which devote themselves entirely to Louis XVI work. For dining-rooms and libraries the fashionable finish is in the styles of Henry II and François I. In city-houses it is not uncommon to sacrifice two feet of the parlor to the hall, in order to give the latter apartment the appearance of a comfortable sitting-room. The styles known to young architects as the "Bloody Mary" and the "Mother Hubbard " have seen their best days. An example of pure Louis XVI is a drawing-room recently renovated by Mr. H. O. Avery, the architect. The woodwork was cleaned with acid, and then subjected to an enamel finish; the walls are a shrimp pink, with Lyons silk in panels decorated with rosettes and intertwined ribbons in relief. The curtains, also of Lyons silk, manufactured after the architect's designs, show a pattern of nosegays held up by ribbons that float over a pink field. On the cream-tinted ceiling are square panels of Louis XVI patterns, surrounded by twined tulip-leaves. The cornice, once a modern classic motive, is now French, with intertwined leaves of ivy. Metal sconces appear between the panels of the walls, at a height of six and a half feet from the floor. All the wood-work has received five coats of paint and three of varnish, and then been rubbed down to its enamel finish with pumice-stone and oil. The old blackwalnut furniture, once covered with darkclaret satin, has been painted pink and upholstered with Lyons silk, like that of the panels of the walls; and the general effect of the room is of cream and gold. This revival of Louis XVI decoration began with the Vanderbilt and Goelet houses in New York city. It extends even to the carpet, which in the draw room just mentioned is in shrimp and creama Louis XVI reflex of the patterns of the ceiling and the walls-manufactured by Templeton Brothers in Scotland, after the architects' designs. A simple and inexpensive method of treating the interior of a seaside cottage, is seen in the illustration of several rooms at North East Harbor, Me., designed by Mr. W. R. Emerson. It may be added that the American architect of to-day desires to have charge of the decoration within the house and the landscape-gardening around it. Both the arrangement of the grounds and the finish of the interior walls are parts of his principal scheme. To many visitors the most interesting contributions to the third annual exhibition of the Architectural League, in New York city, December, 1887, were the designs for countryhouses by William Convers Hazlett, Clarence S. Luce, Charles T. Mott, Charles A. Rich, Rossiter & Wright, Brunner & Tryon, John Calvin Stevens, Wilson Eyre, Jr., and Bruce Price. The object of the league is "the promotion of architecture and the allied fine arts," and among the committees was the Loan Exhibition Committee, which gathered from various private sources nearly two hundred oil paintings, water-color studies, and pieces of sculpture and of furniture. Most of the members have spent years in study in Europe, particularly in Paris, and so great is their confidence in their productive resources that they show freely to one another, twice a month, all their new designs. American architects have hitherto been loath to exhibit their unexecuted designs, for fear that they should be stolen. The league now numbers one hundred and twenty members, residents of New York, Boston, Philadelphia, St. Paul, St. Louis, Albany, Portland, and Buffalo, and is in a highly prosperous condition, its annual exhibitions attracting the best artists and the leading amateurs. We now proceed to describe in detail some representative country-seats of the new epoch. The late Mr. Charles J. Osborn's house at Mamaroneck, New York (Messrs. McKim, Mead, & White, architects) holds the rank of a modern feudal castle. The plan is Lshaped, the length one hundred and fiftythree feet, and the width one hundred and forty-four feet. The large, round parlortower. fifty-three feet high, and twenty-three feet wide at its greatest diameter, is the principal feature of the building as seen from Long Island Sound. The material of the main walls is grayish local stone in the first story, and shingles in the second story, which projects about two feet, and is supported on corbels of rough stone. Through the entire depth of the building is a driveway, fifteen feet wide, under a stone arch, whose keystone is thirteen feet above the ground. The entrance to the house is within this driveway. Panels of pebbles and cockle-shells, set in gray plastering, appear above the arch. A series of casement windows opens into the hall, and a circle-headed window into the billiard-room, with ornamental panels in glass and lead-work. The piazza, forty feet by twenty, extends diagonally from the parlor, on a piece of land that overhangs the water. There are four towers, all of the same height, and three of them of stone. (The tower treatment is conspicuous also in Mr. Joseph H. Choate's house, designed by the same architects, at Stockbridge, Mass.; see illustration, p. 367.) The hall mantel-piece, two stories high, lias an enormous fire-opening, and a wind-gauge connected with the weather-vane. The casement windows, above wide seats, overlook the Sound. The paneled wainscoting of English oak is elaborately carved in the moldings, while mahogany has been used in finishing the parlor, and Santo Domingo mahogany in finishing the dining-room. The reception-room is of pine, painted white and gilded. The part of the building at the right of the covered driveway is separate in design, and intended as a winter-quarters, with hall, billiard-room, smoking-room, dining-room, and bedrooms of its own. A gallery extends around three sides of the main hall in the larger part of the structure. Mr. G. N. Black's house at Manchester-by-the-Sea (see illustration, p. 366) also shows a large driveway through the entire depth of the building. În the beautiful villa of William Simpson, Jr., at Overbrook, near Philadelphia, the architect, Theophilus P. Chandler, Jr, has adopted some features of the old French style. The material is local granite, trimmed with buff Ohio sandstone; the length is one hundred and five feet, and the depth fifty-six feet. As seen in our illustration (p. 369), the north side presents a group of five stained-glass windows, another group of stained-glass windows defining the course of the principal stairs, and a third group lighting the servants' stairs. The oaken hall, twenty-four feet by twenty, has a wainscoting five feet high, a ceiling of opentimber work, and a mantel of carved quarteroak, with fire-facing of carved English red sandstone. In the reception-room and parlor the trimming is of mahogany; in the library and dining-room, of walnut. Four stainedglass windows on the landing of the principal staircase give access to a balcony with an elaborate wought-iron railing. The heating is by low-pressure steam indirectly radiated, and each toilet-room is connected with the kitchen flue by a two-inch spiral ventilating pipe of galvanized iron. Certain French and English features appear in the roof and windows of Travis C. Van Buren's house at Tuxedo Park (see illustration, p. 370), but taken altogether it is as original a piece of work as this country has produced. The architect is Mr. Bruce Price, and attention will be directed, first, to the large central shingled portal, bending inward in a great curve, and strong in contrasts of light and shade; secondly, to the absence of cornices and trimmings, the shingles running up to the stiles, and the casements hanging directly upon them; thirdly, to the convex, flexible lines of the gables, which, being neither straight nor stiff, give an impression of lightness and of life; and fourthly, to the mechanical excellence of the shingling itself, all the courses correctly meeting one another, and not tolerating defects that might have been hidden by a molding. The interior finish is unostentatious, and the entire cost did not exceed ten thousand dollars. Chinese and Japanese houses have recently been constructed in California, several of them at great expense. In Florida are five or six important Moorish houses, the most notable of which is that of Franklin W. Smith, called the Villa Zorayda, at St. Augustine, designed by the owner after sketches made in Spain and northern Africa. The material is the French béton, or concrete, of a pearly gray tint. Two porches, jutting from the upper stories, show light lattice-work. Over the front entrance of the house is an Arabic inscription in heavy relief, to the effect that "There is no conqueror but God." The court is surrounded by horse-shoe arches, ornamented with an abundance of delicate tracery and supported on slender gray pillars. Many fac similes of Arabic inscriptions appear in various places. The staircase is a copy of a pulpit staircase in a Cairo mosque. Divans are placed around the smoking-room, and coffee-cups and a nargileh await the convenience of guests. The fire-place of the dining-room has the shape of an arch well known in Constantinople. În short, this house is thoroughly Moorish without and within. The feature of the interior of Mr. Robert Goelet's house at Newport is the magnitude and beauty of the two-story hall, its length being forty-four feet, its width thirty feet, and its height twenty-four feet. A gallery supported on columns and arches extends around the second story, its balustrade being of turned spindles of oak. The walls are heavily paneled with the same wood, and hung with immense pieces of old tapestry. Much carving appears in the decoration, especially in the rich leaf-work of the large brackets that support the shelves of the chimney-piece. The ornamental massive brackets of brass are in the form of candelabra, and a curious piece of furniture is an antique carved and canopied bedstead, which serves the purpose of a divan. One of the largest houses in the suburbs of Philadelphia, on the Pennsylvania Railroad, is divided by the architects, Messrs. G. W. and W. D. Hewitt, into six parts: First, the large porte-cochère, with its circular bartizan tower, ten feet in diameter and seventy-two feet high; second, the house proper; third, the servants' hail, kitchen, and laundries; fourth, the carriage-house connected therewith by a covered way; fifth, the covered shed; and, sixth, the stable. The advantages sought by this method of construction are, first, mag |