The graceful willow is abundantly used 
movable cushions of green. A superb marble table stands 
in the center, and behind it is a fountain rising from a pool 
let into the floor. The palms and ferns which are banked 
on either side of it add greatly to its effectiveness. There are 
numerous reproductions of Pompeiian bronzes, and Pom- 
peiian designs and motifs have been used wherever possible. 
AMERICAN HOMES 
AND GARDENS September, 1909 
The library is on the left of the hall. Its walls are 
lined with red silk damask. The woodwork, which is 
confined to a low wainscot, the frames of the doors and 
windows, and the broad cornice, is Circassian walnut. 
This wood is also used for the mantel, the space above 
which is filled with a magnificent matched panel of the 
same beautiful wood. The mantel has facings of gray- 
ish marble and green and brass andirons. Just before it 
are two benches or seats, one on each side, which form 
a little space like an inglenook, and contains a tea-table, 
cosily placed for agreeable intercourse. There is a vast 
red rug on the hardwood floor, the furniture covering 
is red leather, and the windows have thin white curtains. 
On the left of the hall is the music-room, which 
faces the entrance front. It is an oval apartment, very 
delicately designed and furnished. The walls are of 
light yellow, with a low wood wainscot painted white, 
and a painted festooned design, which includes small 
figured medallions. The mantel is of carved wood with 
a painting included in the decoration of the room above 
it. The curtains are sage green, with lambrequins, all 
with white borders. The hardwood floor has a green 
rug, and in the center of the ceiling, which otherwise is 
perfectly plain, is a rich decoration in low relief. The 
furniture is mahogany and gilt cane. A finely embroid- 
ered cope hangs over the back of the upright piano. 
Behind this room, on the inner side of the house, but 
entered from the main hall, is the dining-room. This 
is a somewhat long room of very agreeable dimensions 
The walls are in stripes of two shades of green. The 
wood is mahogany and is used in the low wainscot, the 
door and window frames, the broad cornice and the 
mantel and its over-panel. There are white curtains at 
the windows, and the room is, therefore, quite brilliant in its 
effect. The floor is covered with a great green rug in two 
shades. The ceiling is tinted a light buff, and from the cen- 
ter depends a wrought-iron lamp. The mantel has facings 
of reddish marble and large brass andirons. The furniture 
is antique, with green coverings. 
The entrance-drive with porch and tea-house 
LT ey 
Porch overlooking the garden 
September, 1909 
Beyond, and entirely separated from the dining- 
room, is the breakfast-room. This is, indeed, a porch, 
partially enclosed. And a most delightful place it is, 
with its latticed walls, its dome-like ceiling, its corner 
niches, its two entrance doors, its caned furniture with 
gaily covered borders, its table, topped with plate glass 
above the canes, the red cement floor with its rug, and, 
perhaps after all, its color, a grayish ground, on which 
is the lattice work in sage green. It is a room pleasant 
enough to be appetizing, and of exactly the same size 
—and that, of course, is none too large—for an agree- 
able breakfast party. 
Seated here one looks out directly into the large 
pergola, a pergola quite vastly high, and stretching so 
far away from the house that its perspective is most 
unusual. It ends, in truth, against a blank wall, which 
examination presently discloses to belong to one of the 
forcing-houses. And its vine-shadowed walk readily 
invites one to a ramble through the grounds, the extent 
of which is by no means hinted at from the entrance 
of the house, but which, on the inner side, is found to 
be most considerable. One wanders here from garden to 
garden, from greenhouse to greenhouse, from hothouse 
to hothouse, from arbor to arbor. No doubt all these 
things have their special place on the formal plan, but 
the visitor will not concern himself as to arrangements, 
for the charms and delights of this wonderful place are 
so infinite in their variety that more than one journey 
amid their floral delights is essential to their enjoyment. 
As for their understanding, that is quite a different 
matter, for the gardens of “Firenze Cottage’ were 
made for pleasure, and very agreeable and delightful 
are the pleasures they afford. In a certain general way 
these inner gardens consist of certain general groups. The 
hot-houses, forcing-houses, conservatories, and the like, con- 
stitute a group of structures thoroughly utilitarian in purpose 
and very extensive. Even before they have been seen the 
visitor has been made aware that only a horticultural plant 
of the first magnitude could turn out the immense number 
AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 
339 
The breakfast-room is a latticed porch 
of bedding and decorative plants required ‘here, as well as 
care for them in the winter. The houses needed for this 
purpose are, therefore, quite numerous. They are enclosed 
within hedges of plants, chiely cannas, which present a 
brilliant spectacle when a-bloom and almost hide the utili- 
tarian nature of the structures they surround. 
The fountain in the sunken garden 
