HUNTER, ROBERT MERCER TALIAFERRO. 



371 



roof. The rooms must be wide, with through 

 draughts inviting the prevailing winds of sum- 

 mer, yet low-studded and shielded against the 

 blasts of winter. The house must be ample 

 for summer guests and summer hospitality, yet 

 homelike for the family gathering around the 

 winter fireside. These conditions demand 

 original thought and hard study, and fulfilling 

 them brings the architect's reward of facility 

 through training. Facility begets confidence, 

 and with it come new forms in place of the 

 traditions of the studio, dropped one by one. 

 Our distinctive constructive materials call for 

 new lines, masses, and texture in elevations; 

 and, with our national inventiveness fostered 

 by the problem, our work becomes more or less 

 national. Our country-house is already a well- 

 defined school; whether colonial, sixteenth and 

 seventeenth century of England or France, 

 Romanesque from the south of France, or re- 

 naissance, the mass is American and typical in 

 handling. The feeling may survive, but the style 

 of the prototype has been bent to the homes 

 we live in, and in bending yields to a new 

 form. This new form will often borrow from 

 a sympathetic type, and the result will be 

 neither of the two, yet good withal. So we 

 are passing through our incipient renaissance, 

 copying less from the masters we studied and 

 revere, and dropping the word 'style' from 

 our practice." 



Literature. "Artistic .Country- Seats,' 1 five 

 volumes, large folio, one hundred full - page 

 illustrations, (New York, 188Y-'8); articles on 

 " American Country-Dwellings," " Century 

 Magazine," 1886; recent numbers of the 

 " American Architect," the "Sanitary En- 

 gineer," the " Art Age," " Building," and 

 the "Architects and Builders' Edition" of 

 the " Scientific American " ; " Artistic Houses," 

 two hundred large folio views of domestic in- 

 teriors, (New York, 1886.) 



HOTTER, ROBERT MERCER TALIAFERRO, an 

 American lawyer, born in Essex County, Va., 

 April 21, 1809 ; died there, July 18, 1887. He 

 was educated at the University of Virginia and 

 Winchester Law School, and, after being gradu- 

 ated at both institutions, was admitted to the 

 bar, and began practicing in 1830. In 1833 he 

 entered upon his long and notable political 

 career as a member of the State Legislature, 

 where he served three years. At the close of 

 his last term he was elected a member of Con- 

 gress, taking his seat in 1838 as a Democrat. 

 He at once took an advanced position by his 

 advocacy of an independent treasury in opposi- 

 tion to the national-bank scheme, and his bold- 

 ness in combating Henry Clay's protective 

 policy. From that time his free-trade pro- 

 clivities were intensified, and to his last days 

 he was a most uncompromising supporter of 

 that doctrine. Having been re-elected a Rep- 

 resentative, he was chosen Speaker of the 



House in 1839, when but thirty years old. In 

 the Polk canvass of 1844 he was an earnest ad- 

 vocate of that candidate's tariff and Texan poli- 

 cies. He was the author of the warehousing 

 system, which was first incorporated in the 

 tariff bill. In 1843 he was defeated for Con- 

 gress, but in 1845 was re-elected. Before the 

 expiration of his term he was elected to the 

 United States Senate, where he took his seat 

 in December, 1847, and served continuously 

 till his formal expulsion in July, 1861. Dur- 

 ing the greater part of this period he was Chair- 

 man of the Committee on Finance, and was 

 active in the discussion of the great political 

 questions of the day. In 1 854 he supported 

 the Kansas -Nebraska bill, in 1858 that provid- 



ROBEKT MERCER TALIAFERRO HUNTER. 



ing for the admission of Kansas under the Le- 

 compton Constitution, and in 1860 received 

 votes upon several ballots as a candidate for 

 the Democratic nomination to the presidency 

 in the Charleston Convention, having for some 

 time the next highest vote to that for Stephen 

 A. Douglas. After the secession of Virginia 

 he was a delegate to the Confederate Provi- 

 sional Congress, and subsequently he became 

 a Confederate Senator, in which office he was 

 conspicuous for his opposition to Jefferson 

 Davis. He also served for a time as Confed- 

 erate Secretary of State. In February, 18C5, 

 he was associated with Messrs. Stephens and 

 Campbell as commissioners to meet President 

 Lincoln and Secretary Seward at Hampton 

 Roads, to negotiate peace ; but the conference 

 was futile. After the close of the war he was 

 arrested, but was released upon his parole, and 

 pardoned in 1867 by President Johnson. In 

 1875 lie was elected State Treasurer of Vir- 

 ginia, retiring to private life on the expiration 

 of his term. His last public office was that of 

 Collector of Customs at the port of Tappahan- 

 nock, Va., to which he was appointed by Pres- 

 ident Cleveland in June, 1886, and which he 

 held at the time of his death. 



