in the matter of domiciles and their location, 
was evidently given to that independence of which every- 
‘among whose age-yellowed pages runs the 
pants. 
closer touch with the memories of other days. 
filled them with light laughter, 
They cluster like wigwams up the hills 
And down the lanes of the little town, 
And some are stately and dignified, 
While many are old and quaint and brown. 
1g THE ideas of the early inhabitants of Marblehead 
with regard to thoroughfares were not so original 
as they were restricted by the sturdy ledges of rock over 
and around which they were forced to “take their way, 
free rein 
one must have had a goodly share. 
As if scattered by the hand of a generous sower, 
the houses of Marblehead cover almost every inch oi 
the rocky soil. Almost jostling each other, they climb 
the hilly lanes and crowd along the very edges of the 
narrow streets, while here and “there a space proclaims 
a deserter from the ranks and a series of little flights 
of stairs marks the way to its retreat at the top of an 
unexpected hill. 
And each of these odd, old houses is a story-book 
thread of 
many a romance and much adventure. There are stories 
historical, founded on fact, or merely traditional and 
colored by the vivid artistry of the imaginations of suc: 
cessive generations. Always they are interesting, for 
marblehead is strangely conducive to dreaming and her 
fine old houses are filled with an air of yesterday and 
there is an echo of the past in every room. 
We may convert them to our everyday use, modern- 
ize them and fill them with the conveniences of the 
present, but we cannot fill them with our modern atmos- 
phere. Irrevocably they are dedicated, like the slate 
slabs of Old Burial Hill, to the memory of other days. 
The fires on their wide hearths will draw for us oddly 
clear pictures of the family circles that once gathered 
to a like gladdening warmth and there is an all-pervading 
sense of companionship in the quaint or stately rooms, 
as if the genial spirits before their departure had left 
something of their personalities—intangible, elusive, but 
of which we are never unconscious. 
Not many of these old houses will open their doors 
to us, for within their sacred precincts other lives are 
living their short, inconsequent span and adding their 
own history to the time-blurred records of former occu- 
But some, like memorials, are consecrated only 
to the past and serve the present merely to bring it into 
Not all 
the echoing feet of years of visitors have worn away 
the spell that lingers in the old rooms. Almost untouched, 
unvisited they seem, as if it were only yesterday, not a 
century ago, since the quiet, daily life of their owners 
| gentle speech and_ the 
soft rustle of silken garments. 
Such-a memorial is the Lee mansion, situated on 
Washington street, once the main highway of the little 
town. Humble, indeed, and quaint are its surroundings, 
ORTH SHORE BREEZE 
AND REMINDER 
Manchester, Mass., Friday, August 4, 1916 
Half-days in Marblehead 
Old Houses 
No. 31 
ANNE ACTON 
and it has no immediate neighbors to match it in state- 
liness. Ejloquently it bears testimony to the prosperity 
of Marblehead in the years preceding the Revolution. 
It is almost one hundred and fifty years since it 
was built for Col. Jeremiah Lee in 1768. Every inch 
of its massive squareness was brought from over the 
seas and seven years of painstaking labor and an ex- 
penditure of over ten thousand pounds were necessary 
to make it the enduring monument to art and architecture 
that it is today. 
In its own day, those colonial times of simplicity of 
design, of generosity of proportions and of building to 
endure, the home of Col. Lee outshone in its magnificence 
anything in the colony. Today, it is safe to say, our 
entire country boasts nothing like it. Tucked away at 
the foot of one of Marblehead’s many hills, surrounded 
by the quaintly humble neighborhood, this glorious speci- 
men of workmanship of that long-gone day has become 
a shrine to which, yearly, come architects from all over 
the country to wonder and worship and, if possible, to 
copy. Likewise, too, this one-time royalist mansion is 
a Mecca for lovers of things antique. 
The promise of its generous exterior hardly prepares 
us for the wonderful proportions of the. wide entrance 
hall that runs the length of the house and the great width 
of the mahogany stairway. The beauty of the mahog- 
any wainscoting, the wonderful panelled wall-paper that 
has survived the use and disuse of almost one hundred 
and fifty years, and the exquisitely carved stair rails, each 
of a different design, prove a love of accomplishment 
that puts to shame the machine-aided efforts of our 
own time. : 
To the left of the hall is the banquet room, panelled 
from floor to ceiling. Originally it was in white and gold, 
but the passage of time claimed it for business pur- 
poses, and as the banking room of the Marblehead 
National bank it was stained a dark, workaday walnut. 
Its carved mantel is “a thing of beauty” and: the wide 
fireplace and deep, recessed windows give to the huge 
room something of cosiness, despite its stately propor- 
tions and high-flung ceiling. 
It was here in this room that a banquet was given 
in honor of Marquis de Lafayette, and upstairs among a 
collection of highly prized heirlooms is the damask table 
cloth upon which it was spread. 
This carefully guarded relic did not come from 
the linen press of Mistress Lee, for when the table was 
to be laid it was found that the house did not contain 
a cloth large enough to cover it, and a friendly neighbor, 
well-known for her collection of fine linen, sent her 
little daughter with a cloth large enough and fine enough 
to do honor to the distinguished guest. In due time 
the cloth was returned and not until a few years ago 
was it sent again to the Lee mansion. | 
It happened that one afternoon the granddaughter 
of the little girl who had come on such eager feet that 
