AMERICAN ESTATES AND GARDENS 



The front is a hundred and seventy-five feet long and the depth a hundred and fifty- 

 five feet. Such dimensions would be intolerable in a Northern house; but they are none too 

 great here, since the center of the dwelling is occupied by a court, about ninety feet by fifty 

 feet, spacious enough to amply light all the rooms and passages that open upon it, and 

 forming a most entrancing center to this magnificent home. 



Directly before one, as one enters the hall, is the double staircase of white statuary 

 marble to the upper story. It occupies fully a half of the whole length of the hall, standing 

 in a recess of its own, the beginning of the stairs being marked off with four columns of polished 

 American white and green marble, with a great marble vase before each group. The hand- 

 rails are beautiful examples of modern bronze work; before each ramp is a fine piece of old 

 tapestry; a central window looks into the court. The walls are of white and green marble, 

 and at each end is a screen of double columns, standing one close behind the other, forming 

 inner vestibules to the rooms that open from either end. The ceiling is richly carved, and 

 treated in gray with ornamentation in solid gold; in the center is a large circular painting by 

 Benevenotti. The chairs, tables, and chests with which the hall is furnished were expressly 



WHITE HALL" THE ROSE DU BARRY BEDROOM. 



[109] 



