H ouse and Garden 
ENTRANCE OF THE HANSELL HOUSE, I 833 
dining-room on the ground floor and the 
drawing-room on the second, occupying the 
immediate front of the house. 
The Bull-Pringle house is one of the most 
notable examples of the two-storey porch treat¬ 
ment in Colonial work. This really elaborate 
example of the style was built in 1760, at a 
cost of $60,000. The plan was English ; like¬ 
wise were the brick and the interior wood¬ 
work, which, being of a dignified and elab¬ 
orate character, has furnished inspiration to 
American architects for over a century. The 
Early English houses now standing in 
Charleston—the Mason-Smythe house on 
Church Street, the Hayne house on Meeting 
Street, and others that might be named— 
were originally built without verandas. 
These, however, were added in time, for they 
were found to be necessities in the warm cli¬ 
mate. All of these houses, though formal 
in design, and of a certain forbidding mien 
in contrast to the Bermudan type of dwell¬ 
ing that came into vogue as a later style, and 
the houses of the Greek revival, of which 
Charleston has ample share, are furnished 
with excellent exterior details, while the 
woodwork within, revealing considerable va¬ 
TYPICAL HOUSE OF THE MIDDLE CLASS 
riety of design, is usually surprisingly good, 
though less delicate on the whole than the in¬ 
terior woodwork in and around Salem, Mass., 
and through the Genesee Valley. With the 
exception of the interiors, found on the James 
River and in such houses as Brandon, Shir¬ 
ley, Westover and Tuckahoe, Charleston 
presents the best exhibit in the South. In 
even the least pretentious houses one comes 
unawares upon bits of superior excellence. 
This is particularly true of the region around 
what is known as East Bay Street, which is 
now given over to tenement renters, but was, 
prior to the civil war, the residence section 
of the rich. Elere one finds noble old 
houses going to decay and often tenantless, 
yet possessing all those desirable qualities— 
taste, refinement and dignity—within which 
are still to be seen specimens of woodwork 
sufficiently interesting to warrant their re¬ 
moval to and use as features of modern 
houses elsewhere. The panelled walls to be 
found on and around East Bay Street, the 
fine old mantels carried up to the ceiling, 
the broken neck cornices, the door frames, 
all of these attractive details afford a veri¬ 
table study quite to themselves. 
263 
