January, 1915 
HOUSE AND GARDEN 
27 
gestion that we are trying to “resurrect dead bones.” A mantel 
somewhat similar can be found at Plas Mawr, in Carnarvonshire, 
with its combination of the old tradition and the classic; the 
ceiling treatment, in the Long Gallery of Haddon Hall; the sys¬ 
tem of graduated rectangular panels and the plain, leaded win¬ 
dows in many rooms of the period. 
The drawings show a double window; but it might be triple, 
quadruple or single. The frame and mullions should properly be 
stone; the glass and its leading set directly into it, or in slender 
iron casement frames that may open either in or out. We shall 
see many such windows in America during the coming years; in 
England they are used even in the smaller cottages, but here they 
are still expensive. An alternative, though not so true to type, 
would be the glazing of a wooden casement sash with the leaded 
glass: still another way would be the omission of lead altogether, 
with ordinary wooden muntins, slender as possible, dividing the 
sash into small panes. Of course, wooden mullions might replace 
the stone. 
The wainscot in the old examples was nearly always oak, 
either rubbed with oil or just as the carpenter left it; varnishing, 
waxing and such finishes are modern. The English oak is darker 
than ours and is further darkened by extreme age to a delicious 
cool brown, which we try to imitate with our stains; and we 
succeed very well indeed. Long rubbing and polishing have 
smoothed the English oak, and the effect of this we get with our 
wax or our hard varnish rubbed down with pumice. The cost 
of best quartered white oak, set in place, stained and waxed, 
should be about $.75 or $.80 per square foot, with $100.00 added 
for extra work at doors, cornice and corner pilasters above the 
mantel. Assuming a room 16 x 18 feet with wainscoting 7 feet 
6 inches high, we have then: 
16 -f- 16 -j- 18 + 2 -j-2 (for chimney breast) = 72 feet long 
X / A high, or 540 square feet; less the area taken up by stone 
work of the fireplace, 4J/2 high x 11 long (including sides of 
breast), or 49 y 2 square feet, we have: 
540 — 49 y 2 — 490D at .75 = $367.50 + $100.00 = $467.50 
as the cost of the woodwork complete, done in the very 
best manner. This amount could be cut down by using a 
different wood, by omitting the moulding that outlines the 
panels, by simplifying generally. 
The stone fireplace allows a choice of two entirely dif¬ 
ferent materials, limestone or cast concrete stone. The 
old fireplaces were cut in a stone closely resembling our 
Kentucky or Tennessee limestone, and the design we have 
shown, cut in one of these, with the stone carried back to 
the wall at sides and with the stone edging at the hearth, 
would cost about $250.00. The best concrete-stone would 
be much less, $150.00 or thereabouts. If more than one 
fireplace were required, the 
succeeding ones would cost 
about $75.00 apiece; for the 
greatest labor is in making 
the wooden moulds, which 
can be used over and over. 
It is an interesting material 
this concrete-stone. Portland 
cement (almost all the cement 
in common use is Portland 
cement) is mixed dry with 
crushed rock of uneven fine¬ 
ness varying from that of 
sand to pieces as large as 
one's finger-nail; a red sand, 
or a powdered pigment, is 
sometimes added to give col¬ 
or. though to me the attempt 
at any sort of coloring is unsatisfactory; then the material is 
dumped in a machine mixer and the wet mass poured in the 
moulds. These are of the best wood painted with crude oil in¬ 
side to keep the concrete from sticking; but wet sand moulds are 
often used. 
Ordinary concrete is composed of three parts: cement, sand, 
aggregate. The aggregate is either clean cinders or gravel, 
broken slag or broken rock; this forms the bulk of the concrete, 
and the sand merely fills in the cavities, with the cement glueing 
the mass together. The crushed rock used in concrete-stone, be¬ 
ing in both fine and coarse fragments, no sand is necessary. The 
rock may be limestone, conglomerate, trap, quartz, or almost any 
other stone, but crushed granite is one of the best. In propor¬ 
tion of 1 of cement to 2jX of crushed granite, the product re¬ 
sembles limestone rather than granite, and, if properly finished, 
is clear and altogether free from that pasty, dull look which we 
have learned to associate with concrete. 
The dullness is caused in part by free cement mixed with im¬ 
purities settling against the mould. This is called the “skin,” and 
is removed by either scrubbing with brush arid water when the 
cement is “green;” that is, about a day old, or else washing with 
muriatic acid and water several days after casting, or rubbing 
with a wet piece of stone and so exposing the aggregate. Better 
than any of these to me, however, is a bush-hammered finish made 
before the concrete has reached its full hardness. A bush-ham¬ 
mer has its head formed of six or eight thin steel blades piled 
like a stack of playing cards and held together by an iron band 
at the end of the handle. With this the stone is chipped and the 
surface broken away until the granite sparkles through it and the 
texture is neither smooth nor sandy, but rough, like the tooled 
surface of natural stone; a very different affair from the concrete 
“rock-faced” blocks that we see built into small houses in the 
suburbs. 
There is no reason why concrete should not be finished with the 
same tools that are used in finishing natural stone, for. after all, 
(Continued on page 66) 
Elevation of side wall; detail of ceiling. Oak wainscot stained and waxed, (or stained and varnished.) fireplace jambs and 
arch of limestone or concrete stone. Ceiling with cast and applied plaster tracery 
