Garden Furnishings 389 



climate men had not thought to build piazzas sur- 

 rounding the house and shadowing all the ground 

 floor rooms. We are beginning to think anew of 

 the value of sunlight in the parlors and dining rooms 

 of our summer homes, which for the past thirty or 

 forty years have been so darkened by our wide 

 piazzas. Now we have fewer piazzas and more 

 peristyles, and soon we shall have summer-houses 

 and garden houses also. 



There are preserved in the South, in spite of war 

 and earthquake, a number of fine examples of old 

 wrought-iron garden gates. King William of Eng- 

 land introduced these artistic gates into England, 

 and they were the height of garden fashion. Among 

 them were the beautiful gates still at Hampton 

 Court, and those of Bulwich, Northamptonshire. 

 They were called clair-voyees on account of the unin- 

 terrupted view they permitted to those without and 

 within the walls. These were often painted blue ; 

 but in America they were more sober of tint, though 

 portions were gilded. One of the old gates at West- 

 over-on-James is here shown, and on page 390 the 

 rich wrought-iron work in the courtyard at the home 

 of Colonel Colt in Bristol, Rhode Island. This is 

 as fine as the house, and that is a splendid example 

 of the best work of the first years of the nineteenth 

 century. 



Fountains were seen usually in handsome gardens 

 in the South ; simple water jets falling in a handsome 

 basin of marble or stone. Statuary of marble or lead 

 was never common in old American gardens, though 

 pretentious gardens had examples. To-day, in ou" 



