Vintage Wallpaper

AN ACCOUNT OF THE PICTORIAL PAPERS
ON OUR FOREFATHERS' WALLS

WITH A STUDY OF THE

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF WALL
PAPER MAKING AND DECORATION

BY

GREENWICH CONNECTICUT
THE LITERARY COLLECTOR PRESS
NEW YORK
1905

Clifford & Lawton
19 Union Square West, New York City
SOLE AGENTS

Copyright, 1905
BY KATE SANBORN

TO

A. S. C.

THE CHATELAINE OF ELM BANK

[vii]

IF a book has ever been written on this subject it has been impossible to discover; and to get reliable facts for a history of the origin and development of the art of making wall-papers has been a serious task, although the result seems scanty and superficial. Some friends may wonder at the lack of fascinating bits of gossip, stories of rosy romance and somber tragedy in connection with these papers. But those who chatted, danced, flirted, wept or plotted in the old rooms are long since dust, and although the "very walls have ears" they have not the gift of speech. But my collection of photographs is something entirely unique and will increase in value every year. The numerous photographers, to whom I have never appealed in vain, are regarded by me as not only a skillful but a saintly class of men.

I am greatly indebted to Miss Mary M. Brooks of Salem and Miss Mary H. Buckingham of Boston for professional assistance. Many others have most kindly helped me by offers of photographs and interesting facts[viii] concerning the papers and their histories. But I am especially indebted to Mrs. Frederick C. Bursch, who has given much of her time to patient research, to the verification or correction of doubtful statements, and has accomplished a difficult task in arranging and describing the photographs. Without her enthusiastic and skillful assistance, my collection and text would have lacked method and finish.

To the many, both acquaintances and strangers, who have volunteered assistance and have encouraged when discouragement was imminent, sending bracing letters and new-old pictures, I can only quote with heartfelt thanks the closing lines of the verse written by Foote, the English actor, to be posted conspicuously to attract an audience to his benefit—

IPage

FROM MUD WALLS AND CANVAS TENTS TO DECORATIVE PAPERS 1

II

PROGRESS AND IMPROVEMENT IN THE ART 23

III

EARLIEST WALL PAPERS IN AMERICA 41

IV

WALL PAPERS IN HISTORIC HOMES 61

V

NOTES FROM HERE AND THERE 85

VI

REVIVAL AND RESTORATION OF OLD WALL PAPERS 103

[xi]

[1]

"HOW very interesting! Most attractive and quite unique! I supposed all such old papers had gone long ago. How did you happen to think of such an odd subject, and how ever could you find so many fine old specimens? Do you know where the very first wall-paper was made?"

These are faint echoes of the questions suggested by my collection of photographs of wall-papers of the past. The last inquiry, which I was unable to answer, stimulated me to study, that I might learn something definite as to the origin and development of the art of making such papers.

Before this, when fancying I had found a really new theme, I was surprised to discover that every one, from Plato and Socrates to Emerson, Ruskin and Spencer, had carefully gleaned over the same ground, until the amount of material became immense and unmanageable. Not so now. I appealed in vain to several public libraries; they had nothing at all on the subject. Poole's[2] Index—that precious store-house of information—was consulted, but not one magazine article on my theme could be found. I then sent to France, England and Italy, and employed professional lookers-up of difficult topics; but little could be secured. The few who had studied paper hangings were very seldom confident as to positive dates and facts.

One would seem safe in starting with China, as paper was certainly invented there, and many of the earliest designs were of Chinese scenes; but the honor is also claimed for Japan and Persia and Egypt. It is difficult to decide in view of the varying testimony.

I was assured by a Japanese expert, who consulted a friend for the facts, that neither the Chinese nor the Japanese have ever used paper to cover their walls. At the present day, the inner walls of their houses are plastered white, and usually have a strip of white paper running around the bottom, about a foot and a half high.

On the other hand, Clarence Cook, in his book, What Shall We Do With Our Walls?, published in 1880, says as to the origin of wall-paper: "It may have been one of the many inventions borrowed from the East, and might be traced, like the introduction of porcelain, to the Dutch trade with China and Japan." And he finds that the Japanese made great use of paper, their walls being lined with this material, and the divisions between the rooms made largely, if not entirely, by means of screens covered with paper or silk. Japanese wall-paper does not come in rolls like ours, but in pieces, a little longer than broad, and of different sizes. He adds:

"What makes it more probable that our first European notion of[3] wall-papers came from Japan, is the fact that the first papers made in Holland and then introduced into England and France, were printed in these small sizes [about three feet long by fifteen inches wide]. Nor was it until some time in the eighteenth century that the present mode of making long rolls was adopted. These early wall-papers were printed from blocks, and were only one of many modifications and adaptations of the block printing which gave us our first books and our first wood-cuts.

"The printing of papers for covering walls is said to have been introduced into Spain and Holland about the middle of the sixteenth century. And I have read, somewhere, that this mode of printing the patterns on small pieces of paper was an imitation of the Spanish squares of stamped and painted leather with which the grandees of Spain covered their walls, a fashion that spread all over Europe.

"We are told that wall-paper was first used in Europe as a substitute for the tapestry so commonly employed in the middle ages, partly as a protection against the cold and damp of the stone walls of the houses, partly, no doubt, as an ornament."

But here is something delightfully positive from A. Blanchet's Essai sur L'Histoire du Papier et de sa Fabrication, Exposition retrospective de la Papetier, Exposition Universelle, Paris, 1900.

Blanchet says that paper was invented in China by Tsai Loon, for purposes of writing. He used fibres of bark, hemp, rags, etc. In 105 A. D. he reported to the government on his process, which was highly approved. He was given the honorary title of Marquis and other honors. The first paper book was brought to Japan[4] from Corea, then a part of China, in 285. The conquest of Turkestan by the Arabs, through which they learned the manufacture of paper, came in the battle fought on the banks of the River Tharaz, in July, 751. Chinese captives brought the art to Samarcand, from which place it spread rapidly to other parts of the Arabian Empire. Damascus was one of the first places to receive it. In Egypt, paper began to take the place of papyrus in the ninth century, and papyrus ceased to be used in the tenth. The Arabian paper was made of rags, chiefly linen, and sized with wheat starch. European paper of the thirteenth century shows, under the microscope, fibres of flax and hemp, with traces of cotton. About 1400, animal glue was first used for sizing. The common belief that Arabian and early European paper was made of cotton is a mistake. There has never been any paper made of raw cotton, and cotton paper anywhere is exceptional. In 1145, when the troops of Abd el Mounin were about to attack the capital of Fez, the inhabitants covered the vault of the mihrab of the mosque with paper, and put upon this a coating of plaster, in order to preserve from destruction the fine carvings which are still the admiration of visitors. The mihrab of an Arabic mosque is a vaulted niche or alcove, in which the altar stands and towards which the worshippers look while they pray. This is probably the earliest approach to the use of wall-paper and shows the excellent quality of the paper.

Herbert Spencer states that "Dolls, blue-books, paper-hangings are lineally descended from the rude sculpture paintings in which the Egyptians represented the triumphs and worship of their god-kings." No[5] doubt this is true, but the beginning of paper, and probably of wall-paper, was in China.

Paper made of cotton and other vegetable fibres by the Chinese was obtained by the Arabs in trade, through Samarcand. When they captured that city, in 704 A.D. they learned the process from Chinese captives there, and soon spread it over their empire. It was known as "Charta Damascena" in the Middle Ages, and was extensively made also in Northern Africa. The first paper made in Europe was manufactured by the Moors in Spain, at Valencia, Toledo, and Xativa. At the decline of Moorish power, the Christians took it up, but their work was not so good. It was introduced into Italy through the Arabs in Sicily; and the Laws of Alphonso, 1263, refer to it as "cloth parchment." The earliest documents on this thick "cotton" paper date from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, as a deed of King Roger of Sicily, dated 1102, shows. When made further north, other materials, such as rags and flax, were used. The first mention of rag paper, in a tract of Peter, Abbott of Cluny from 1122 to 1150, probably means woolen. Linen paper was not made until in the fourteenth century.

The Oriental papers had no water mark,—which is really a wire mark. Water-mark paper originated in the early fourteenth century, when paper-making became an European industry; and a considerable international trade can be traced by means of the water marks.

The French Encyclopædia corroborates Blanchet's statement that the common notion that the Arabic and early European papers were made of cotton is a mistake; the microscope shows rag and flax fibres in the earliest.

[6]

Frederic Aumonier says: "From the earliest times man has longed to conceal the baldness of mud walls, canvas tents or more substantial dwellings, by something of a decorative character. Skins of animals, the trophies of the chase, were probably used by our remote ancestors for ages before wall-paintings and sculptures were thought of. The extreme antiquity of both of these latter methods of wall decoration has recently received abundant confirmation from the valuable work done by the Egyptian Research Department, at Hierakonopolis, where wall-paintings have been discovered in an ancient tomb, the date of which has not yet been determined, but which is probably less than seven thousand years old; and by the discovery of ancient buildings under the scorching sand dunes of the great Sahara, far away from the present boundary line of habitable and cultivated land. The painted decorations on the walls of some of the rooms in these old-world dwellings have been preserved by the dry sand, and remain almost as fresh as they were on the day they left the hand of the artist, whose bones have long since been resolved into their native dust."

From the Encyclopædia Britannica I condense the long article on "Mural Decoration":

There is scarcely one of the numerous branches of decorative art which has not at some time or other been applied to the ornamentation of wall-surfaces.

I. Reliefs sculptured in marble or stone; the oldest method of wall decoration.

II. Marble veneer; the application of thin marble linings to wall surfaces, these linings often being highly variegated.

III. Wall linings of glazed bricks or tiles. In the[7] eleventh and twelfth centuries, the Moslems of Persia brought their art to great perfection and used it on a large scale, chiefly for interiors. In the most beautiful specimens, the natural growth of trees and flowers is imitated. About 1600 A. D., this art was brought to highest perfection.

IV. Wall coverings of hard stucco, frequently enriched with relief and further decorated with delicate paintings in gold and colors, as at the Alhambra at Granada and the Alcazar at Seville.

V. Sgraffito; a variety of stucco work used chiefly in Italy, from the sixteenth century down. A coat of stucco is made black by admixture of charcoal. Over this a second very thin coat of white stucco is laid. The drawing is made to appear in black on a white ground, by cutting away the white skin enough to show the black undercoat.

VI. Stamped leather; magnificent and expensive, used during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, in Italy, Spain, France, and later in England.

VII. Painted cloth. In King Henry IV., Falstaff says his soldiers are "slaves, as ragged as Lazarus in the painted cloth." Canvas, painted to imitate tapestry, was used both for ecclesiastical and domestic hangings. English mediæval inventories contain such items as "stayned cloth for hangings"; "paynted cloth with stories and batailes"; and "paynted cloths of beyond-sea-work." The most important existing example is the series of paintings of the Triumph of Julius Caesar, now in Hampton Court. These designs were not meant to be executed in tapestry, but were complete as wall-hangings. Godon, in Peinture sur Toile, says: "The painted canvasses kept at the Hôtel Dieu at Rheims were[8] done in the fifteenth century, probably as models for woven tapestries. They have great artistic merit. The subjects are religious." Painted cloths were sometimes dyed in a manner similar to those Indian stuffs which were afterwards printed and are now called chintzes. It is recorded somewhere, that the weaving industry was established at Mulhouse (Rixheim) by workers who left Rheims at a time when laws were passed there to restrict the manufacture of painted cloths, because there was such a rage for it that agriculture and other necessary arts were neglected.

VIII. Printed hangings and wall-papers. The printing of various textiles with dye-colors and mordaunts is probably one of the most ancient of the arts. Pliny describes a dyeing process employed by the ancient Egyptians, in which the pattern was probably formed by printing from blocks. The use of printed stuffs is of great antiquity among the Hindus and Chinese, and was practised in Western Europe in the thirteenth century, and perhaps earlier. The South Kensington Museum has thirteenth-century specimens of block-printed linen made in Sicily, with beautiful designs. Later, toward the end of the fourteenth century, a great deal of block-printed linen was made in Flanders and was imported largely into England.

Tapestries as wall-hangings were used in the earliest times, and, as tiles and papers were copied from them, they must be spoken of here. One remarkable example of tapestry from a tomb in the Crimea is supposed by Stephani to date from the fourth century before Christ. Homer frequently describes tapestry hangings, as when he alludes to the cloth of purple[9] wool with a hunting scene in gold thread, woven by Penelope for Ulysses. Plutarch, in his Life of Themistocles, says, "Speech is like cloth of Arras, opened and put abroad, whereby the imagery doth appear in figure; whereas in thoughts they lie but as in packs."

The oldest tapestry now in existence is the set of pieces known as the Bayeux Tapestry, preserved in the library at Bayeux, near Caen, in France, and said to be the work of Matilda, Queen of William the Conqueror. These pieces measure two hundred and thirty-one feet long and twenty inches wide.

It is generally believed, and stated as a fact in the various guide-books, that the Bayeux Tapestry was the work of Queen Matilda, the consort of the Conqueror, assisted by her ladies. At that time, English ladies were renowned for their taste and skill in embroidery. Their work was known throughout Europe as English work. The Conquest having brought the people of Normandy and England into close intercourse, it is pointed out that on William's return to France, he must have taken with him many Saxons, with their wives and daughters, in honorable attendance upon him; and that these ladies might have helped Matilda and her companions in making this historical piece of needlework. Many historians, however, incline to the opinion that Matilda and her ladies had nothing to do with the tapestry, although it was done during her lifetime.

It is amusing to note how Miss Strickland, in her Lives of the Queens of England, takes up the cudgels in a very vigorous manner on behalf of Matilda's claim:

"The archæologists and antiquaries would do well[10] to direct their intellectual powers to more masculine objects of enquiry, and leave the question of the Bayeux Tapestry (with all other matters allied to needle-craft) to the decision of the ladies, to whose province it belongs. It is a matter of doubt whether one out of the many gentlemen who have disputed Matilda's claim to that work, if called upon to execute a copy of either of the figures on canvas, would know how to put in the first stitch."

But Dr. Daniel Rock, in his exhaustive work on Tapestries, casts the gravest doubts upon the tradition that this needlework owed its origin to Matilda and her ladies: "Had such a piece anywise or ever belonged to William's wife, we must think that, instead of being let stray away to Bayeux, toward which place she bore no particular affection, she would have bequeathed it, like other things, to her beloved church at Caen."

The author points out that there is no mention of the tapestry in the Queen's will, while two specimens of English needlework, a chasuble and a vestment, are left to the Church of the Trinity at Caen, the beautiful edifice founded by her at the time when her husband founded the companion church of St. Etienne in the same city. In fact, Dr. Rock thinks the tapestry was made in London, to the order of three men quite unknown to fame, whose names appear more than once on the tapestry itself. Coming over with the Conqueror, they obtained wide possessions in England, as appears from the Doomsday Book, and would naturally have wished to make a joint offering to the cathedral of their native city. In support of this view, it is shown that the long strip of needlework exactly fits both sides of[11] the nave of the cathedral at Bayeux, where until recent times it has hung.

The tapestry has undergone so many vicissitudes that it is a matter for wonder that it has been preserved in such good condition for eight hundred years. At one time it was exhibited at the Hôtel de Ville, at Bayeux, fixed panorama-fashion on two rollers, so that it was at the disposal of the fingers as well as the eyes of the curious. When Napoleon was thinking of invading this country, he had the tapestry carried to the various towns of France and publicly exhibited, so as to arouse popular enthusiasm on behalf of his designs.

In 1871, when the Prussians were thought to be in dangerous proximity to Bayeux, the tapestry was taken down, enclosed in a metal cylinder, and buried in a secret place until the close of the war. Now it is kept in the Public Library in an upright glass case, which forms the sides of a hollow parallelogram, the tapestry being carried first round the outside and then round the inside space, so that every part of it is open to inspection, while it cannot be touched or mutilated. This valuable information is given by Mr. T. C. Hepworth.

In the Old Testament we find records of "hangings of fine twined linen" and "hangings of white cloth, of green, of blue, fastened with cords of fine linen and purple." Shakespeare has several allusions to tapestry: as, "fly-bitten tapestry"; "worm-eaten tapestry"; "covered o'er with Turkish tapestry"; "the tapestry of my dining chambers"; "it was hanged with tapestry of silk"; "in cypress chests my arras"; "hangings all of Tyrian tapestry."

Cardinal Wolsey's private accounts and inventories,[12] still preserved, state that in 1552 he bought one hundred and thirty-two large pieces of Brussels tapestry, woven with Scriptural subjects and mostly made to order, so as to fit exactly the various wall spaces. Among the wall-pieces, "in addition to the numerous sacred subjects are mentioned mythological scenes, romances, historical pieces and hangings of verdure," the last being decorative work, in which trees and foliage formed the main design, with accessory figures engaged in hunting, hawking and the like.

We read in Gibbon's Rome that Charles the Sixth despatched, by way of Hungary, Arras tapestry representing the battles of the great Alexander. And Macaulay inquires, "Where were now the brave old hangings of Arras which had adorned the walls of lordly mansions in the days of Elizabeth?"

According to Shakespeare, the arras was found convenient to conceal eaves-droppers, those planning a frolic or plotting mischief; or for a hasty lunch, as in The Woman Hater, by Beaumont and Fletcher:

Arras was used precisely the same as a curtain; it hung on tenters or lines from the rafters or from some temporary stay, and was opened, held up, or drawn aside, as occasion required. The writers of the day frequently mentioned these wall-hangings. Evelyn, in his diary, 1641, says, "We were conducted to the lodgings, tapestry'd with incomparable arras."

Scott, in The Lady of the Lake, has this couplet:

[13]

And in Waverley he speaks of "remnants of tapestried hangings, window curtains and shreds of pictures with which he had bedizened his tatters."

After the seventeenth century, these tapestries were used for covering furniture, as the seats and backs of sofas and arm chairs, desks and screens; and fire-screens covered with tapestry as beautiful as a painting were in vogue. In the Comedy of Errors we recall this passage:

Clarence Cook says: "There was a kind of tapestry made in Europe in the fifteenth century—in Flanders, probably—in which there were represented gentlemen and ladies, the chatelaine and her suite walking in the park of the chateau. The figures, the size of life, seem to be following the course of a slender stream. The park in which these noble folk are stiffly disporting is represented by a wide expanse of meadow, guiltless of perspective, stretching up to the top of the piece of stuff itself, a meadow composed of leaves and flowers—bluebells, daisies, and flowers without a name—giving the effect of a close mosaic of green, mottled with colored spots. On the meadow are scattered various figures of animals and birds—the lion, the unicorn, the stag, and the rabbit. Here, too, are hawks and parrots; in the upper part is a heron, which has been brought down by a hawk and is struggling with the victor, some highly ornamental drops of blood on the heron's breast showing that he is done for. And to return to the brook which winds along the bottom of the tapestry, it is curious to note that this part of the work is more real[14] and directly natural in its treatment than the rest. The water is blue, and is varied by shading and by lines that show the movement of the stream; the plants and bushes growing along its borders are drawn with at least a conventional look of life, some violets and fleur-de-lis being particularly well done; and in the stream itself are sailing several ducks, some pushing straight ahead, others nibbling the grass along the bank, and one, at least, diving to the bottom, with tail and feet in the air."

The best authority on tapestries in many lands is the exhaustive work by Muntz, published in Paris, 1878-1884, by the Société anonyme de Publication Périodique—three luxuriously bound and generously illustrated volumes, entitled Histoire Générale de la Tapisserie en Italie, en Allemagne, en Angleterre, en Espagne.

We learn here that in 1630 Le François, of Rouen, incited by the Chinese colored papers imported by the missionaries, tried to imitate the silk tapestries of the wealthy in a cheaper substance. He spread powdered wool of different colors on a drawing covered with a sticky substance on the proper parts. This papier velouté, called tontisse by Le François, was exported to England, where it became known as "flock paper." The English claim a previous invention by Jeremy Lanyer, who, in 1634, had used Chinese and Japanese processes. At any rate, the manufacture of flock papers spread in England and was given up in France. Only toward the middle of the eighteenth century was the making of real colored papers (papier peints) begun in France and England. The first factory was set up in 1746, but the work was not extended further until 1780, when it was taken up by the brothers George and Frederic Echardt.

[15]

Chinese picture papers were imported into France by Dutch traders and used to decorate screens, desks, chimney-pieces, etc., as early as the end of the seventeenth century. By the middle of the eighteenth, they were an important ornament of elegant interiors. In the list of the furniture given to Mlle. Desmares by Mlle. Damours, September 25, 1746, is a fire-screen of China paper, mounted on wood, very simple. On July 25, 1755, Lazare Duvaux delivered to Mme. de Brancas, to be sent to the Dauphiness, a sheet of China paper with very beautiful vases and flowers, for making which he charged thirty livres. April 6, 1756, he sold to the Countess of Valentinois, for one hundred and forty-four livres, six sheets of China paper, painted on gauze with landscapes and figures.

May 8, 1770, M. Marin advertised for sale in a Paris newspaper twenty-four sheets of China paper, with figures and gilt ornaments, ten feet high and three and one-half feet wide, at twenty-four livres a sheet; to be sold all together, or in lots of eight sheets each. By this time whole rooms were papered. July 15, 1779, an apartment in Paris was advertised to let, having a pretty boudoir with China paper in small figures representing arts and crafts, thirteen sheets, with a length of thirty-seven feet (horizontally) and height of eight feet ten inches, with gilt beaded moulding. Dec. 31, 1781, "For sale, at M. Nicholas's, China wall-paper, glazed, blue ground, made for a room eighteen feet square, with gilt moulding."

Mr. Aumonier says: "Notwithstanding the Chinese reputation for printing from wooden blocks from time immemorial, no specimens of their work produced by[16] that process have ever come under the notice of the author, in public museums or elsewhere, and it is far more probable that early Chinese works imported into Europe were painted by hand, in imitation of the wondrous needlework, for which, through unknown ages, the Eastern peoples have been famous. A most perfect and beautiful example of this work, of Japanese origin, may be seen in the "Queen's palace at the Hague," called the Huis-ten-Bosch—the House-in-the-Wood. This is a magnificent composition of foliage and flowers, birds and butterflies, perfect in form and beauty of tint, worked in silks on a ground of écru satin. It is composed of many breadths forming one picture, starting from the ground with rock-work, and finishing at the top of the wall with light sprays of flowers, birds, butterflies and sky; the colouring of the whole so judiciously harmonized as to be an object lesson of great value to any decorator, and worth traveling many miles to study."

I think that we may now safely say that China holds the honors in this matter. And as most of us grow a bit weary of continuous citations from cyclopedias, which are quoted because there is nothing less didactic to quote, and there must be a historical basis to stand on and start from, let us wander a little from heavy tomes and see some of the difficulties encountered in looking up old wall-papers to be photographed.

An American artist, who has made his home in Paris for years, looked over the photographs already collected, grew enthusiastic on the subject, and was certain he could assist me, for, at the Retrospective Exhibition held in that city in 1900, he remembered having seen a[17] complete exhibition of wall-papers and designs from the beginning. Of course the dailies and magazines of that season would have full reports. "Just send over to Jack Cauldwell—you know him. He is now occupying my studio, and he will gladly look it up."

I wrote, and waited, but never received any response; heard later that he was painting in Algiers and apparently all the hoped-for reports had vanished with him. My famously successful searcher after the elusive and recondite gave up this fruitless hunt in despair. Other friends in Paris were appealed to, but could find nothing.

Then many told me, with confidence, that there must be still some handsome old papers in the mansions of the South. And I did my best to secure at least some bits of paper, to show what had been, but I believe nearly all are gone "down the back entry of time."

One lady, belonging to one of the best old families of Virginia, writes me, "My brother has asked me to write to you about wall-papers. I can only recall one instance of very old or peculiar papering in the South, and my young cousin, who is a senior in the Columbia School of Architecture and very keen on 'Colonial' details, tells me that he only knows of one. He has just been through tide-water Virginia, or rather, up the James and Rappahannock rivers, and he says those houses are all without paper at all, as far as he knows.

"At Charlestown, West Virginia, there is a room done in tapestry paper in classic style, the same pattern being repeated, but this is not old, being subsequent to 1840. The room that I have seen is wainscoted, as is the one at Charlestown, and has above the wainscoting a tapestry paper also in shades of brown on a white ground.

[18]

"The principal wall has a large classical design, with columns, ships and figures, not unlike the Turner picture of Carthage, as I remember it. This picture is not repeated, but runs into others. Whether each is a panel, or they are merged into one another by foliage, I am unable to recall. I know that there is a stag hunt and some sylvan scenes. It seemed as if the paper must have been made with just such a room in mind, as the patterns seemed to fit the spaces. As the room was the usual corner parlor common to Southern mansions, it was probably made for the type. I was told by a boarder in this house that the paper was old and there were similar papers in Augusta County. I do not know whether these are choice and rare instances, or whether they are numerous and plentiful in other sections."

All my responses from the South have been cordial and gracious and interesting, but depressing.

I hear, in a vague way, of papers that I really should have—in Albany and Baltimore. We all know of the papers in the Livingston and Jumel mansions; the former are copied for fashionable residences.

I heard of some most interesting and unusual papers in an old house in Massachusetts, and after struggling along with what seemed almost insurmountable hindrances, was at last permitted to secure copies. The owner of the house died; the place was to be closed for six months; then it was to be turned over to the church, for a parsonage, and I agonised lest one paper might be removed at once as a scandalous presentment of an unholy theme. I was assured that in it the Devil himself was caught at last, by three revengeful women, who, in a genuine tug-of-war scrimmage, had torn away all of his tail but a stub end. Finally I gained a rather grudging permit for my photographer to copy the[19] papers—"if you will give positive assurance that neither house nor walls shall be injured in the slightest degree."

As the artist is a quiet gentleman—also an absolute abstainer—so that I could not anticipate any damage from a rough riot or a Bacchanalian revel, I allowed him to cross the impressive threshold of the former home of a Massachusetts governor, and the result was a brilliant achievement, as may be seen in the end papers of this book.

Sometimes when elated by a promise that a certain paper, eagerly desired, could be copied, I sent my man only to have the door held just a bit open, while he heard the depressing statement that madam had "changed her mind and didn't want the paper to be taken."

All this is just a reminder that it is not entirely easy to get at what is sure so soon to disappear. And I mourn that I did not think years ago of securing photographs of quaint and antique papers.

Man has been defined as "an animal who collects." There is no hobby more delightful, and in this hunt I feel that I am doing a real service to many who have not time to devote to the rather difficult pursuit of what will soon be only a remembrance of primitive days.

[23]

IF we go far enough back in trying to decide the origin of almost any important discovery, we are sure to find many claimants for the honor. It is said, on good authority, that "paper-hangings for the walls of rooms were originally introduced in China." This may safely be accepted as correct. The Chinese certainly discovered how to make paper, then a better sort for wall hangings, and by Chinese prisoners it was carried to Arabia. Travellers taking the news of the art to their homes in various countries, it soon became a subject of general interest, and variations and inventions in paper manufacture were numerous.

We are apt to forget how much we owe to the Chinese nation—the mariners' compass, gun-powder, paper, printing by moveable types (a daily paper has been published in Pekin for twelve hundred years, printed, too, on silk). They had what we call The Golden Rule five hundred years before Christ was born. With six times the population of the United States, they are the only people in the world who have[24] maintained a government for three thousand years.

The earliest papers we hear of anywhere were imported from China, and had Chinese or Indian patterns; coming first in small sheets, then in rolls. Some of the more elaborate kinds were printed by hand; others were printed from blocks. These papers, used for walls, for hangings, and for screens, were called "pagoda papers," and were decorated with flowers, symbolic animals and human figures.

The Dutch were among the most enterprising, importing painted hangings from China and the East about the middle of the sixteenth century. Perhaps these originated in Persia; the word "chintz" is of Persian origin, and the French name for its imitations was "perses."

From the Dutch, these imported hangings were soon carried to England, France, Germany and other Continental nations. Each nation was deadly jealous in regard to paper-making, even resorting, in Germany in 1390, to solemn vows of secrecy from the workman and threats of imprisonment for betrayal of methods. Two or three centuries later, the Dutch prohibited the exportation of moulds under no less a penalty than death.

The oldest allusion to printed wall-papers that I have found is in an account of the trial, in 1568, of a Dutch printer, Herman Schinkel of Delft, on the charge of printing books inimical to the Catholic faith. The examination showed that Schinkel took ballad paper and printed roses and stripes on the back of it, to be used as a covering for attic walls.

In the Library of the British Museum may be seen a book, printed in Low Dutch, made of sixty specimens[25] of paper, each of a different material. The animal and vegetable products of which the workmen of various countries tried to manufacture paper would make a surprising list. In England, a paper-mill was set up probably a century before Shakespeare's time. In the second part of Henry the Sixth is a reference to a paper-mill.

About 1745, the Campagnie des Indes began to import these papers directly. They were then also called "Indian" papers. August 21, 1784, we find an advertisement: "For sale—20 sheets of India paper, representing the cultivation of tea."

Such a paper, with this same theme, was brought to America one hundred and fifty years ago—a hand-painted Chinese wall-paper, which has been on a house in Dedham ever since, and is to-day in a very good state of preservation. Of this paper I give three reproductions from different walls of the room.

In Le Mercure, June, 1753, M. Prudomme advertised an assortment of China paper of different sizes; and again, in May, 1758, that he had received many very beautiful India papers, painted, in various sizes and grounds, suitable for many uses, and including every kind that could be desired. This was the same thing that was called "China" paper five years before.

The great development of the home manufacture of wall-papers, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, put an end to the importation from China. The English were probably the first importers of these highly decorative Chinese papers, and quickly imitated them by printing the papers. These "papiers Anglais" soon became known on the Continent, and the French were also at work as rivals in their manufacture and use.[26] Of a book published in 1847, called The Laws of Harmonious Colouring, the author, one David R. Hay, was house painter and decorator to the Queen. I find that he was employed as a decorator and paper-hanger by Sir Walter Scott, and he says that Sir Walter directed everything personally. Mr. Hay speaks of a certain Indian paper, of crimson color, with a small gilded pattern upon it. "This paper Sir Walter did not quite approve of for a dining-room, but as he got it as a present, expressly for that purpose, and as he believed it to be rare, he would have it put up in that room rather than hurt the feelings of the donor. I observed to Sir Walter that there would be scarcely enough to cover the wall; he replied in that case I might paint the recess for the side-board in imitation of oak." Mr. Hay found afterwards that there was quite enough paper, but Sir Walter, when he saw the paper on the recess, heartily wished that the paper had fallen short, as he liked the recess much better unpapered. So in the night Mr. Hay took off the paper and painted the recess to look like paneled oak. This was in 1822.

Sir Walter, in a letter to a friend, speaks of "the most splendid Chinese paper, twelve feet high by four wide; enough to finish the drawing-room and two bed-rooms, the color being green, with rich Chinese figures." Scott's own poem, The Lady of the Lake, has been a favorite theme for wall-paper.

Professor W. E. D. Scott, the Curator of Ornithology at Princeton College, in his recent book, The Story of a Bird Lover, alludes, in a chapter about his childhood, to the papers on the walls of his grandfather's home: "As a boy, the halls interested me enormously;[27] they have been papered with such wall-paper as I have never seen elsewhere. The entrance hall portrayed a vista of Paris, apparently arranged along the Seine, with ladies and gentlemen promenading the banks, and all the notable buildings, the Pantheon, Notre Dame, and many more distributed in the scene, the river running in front.

"But it was when I reached the second story that my childish imagination was exercised. Here the panorama was of a different kind; it represented scenes in India—the pursuit of deer and various kinds of smaller game, the hunting of the lion and the tiger by the the natives, perched on great elephants with magnificent trappings. These views are not duplicated in the wall-paper; the scene is continuous, passing from one end of the hall to the other, a panorama rich in color and incident. I had thus in my mind a picture of India, I knew what kind of trees grew there, I knew the clothes people wore and the arms they used while hunting. To-day the same paper hangs in the halls of the old house."

There are several papers of this sort, distinctly Chinese, still on walls in this country. A house near Portsmouth, which once belonged to Governor Wentworth, has one room of such paper, put on about 1750. In Boston, in a Beacon Street house, there is a room adorned with a paper made to order in China, with a pattern of birds and flowers, in which there is no repetition; and this is not an uncommon find. A brilliant example of this style may be seen in Salem, Mass.

Chinese papers, which were made for lining screens and covering boxes, were used in England and this country for wall-papers, and imitated both there and here.[28] One expert tells me that the early English papers were often designed after India cottons, in large bold patterns.

The first use in France of wall-papers of French manufacture was in the sixth century. Vachon tells about Jehan Boudichon and his fifty rolls of paper for the King's bed-chamber in 1481, lettered and painted blue; but it is evident from the context that they were not fastened on the walls, but held as scrolls by figures of angels.

Colored papers were used for temporary decorations at this time, as at the entrance of Louis XIII. into Lyons, on July 17, 1507. There is nothing to show that the "deux grans pans de papier paincts," containing the history of the Passion, and of the destruction of Jerusalem from the effects of the cannon of St. Peter, were permanently applied to a wall. So with another painted paper, containing the genealogy of the Kings of France, among the effects of Jean Nagerel, archdeacon at Rouen in 1750. These pictured papers, hung up on the walls as a movable decoration, form one step in the development of applied wall-papers.

In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the commonest patterns for unpictorial wall decoration were taken from the damasks and cut-velvets of Sicily, Florence, Genoa, and other places in Italy. Some form of the pine-apple or artichoke pattern was the favorite, a design developed partly from Oriental sources and coming to perfection at the end of the fifteenth century, copied and reproduced in textiles, printed stuffs, and wall-papers, with but little change, down to the nineteenth century.

From the Encyclopædia Britannica, Vol. XVII, I quote again: "Wall-papers did not come into common[29] use in Europe until the eighteenth century, though they appear to have been used much earlier by the Chinese. A few rare examples exist in England, which may be as early as the eighteenth century; these are imitations, generally in flock, of the fine old Florentine and Genoese cut-velvets, and hence the style of the design in no way shows the date of the paper, the same traditional patterns being reproduced for many years, with little or no change. Machinery enabling paper to be made in long strips was not invented till the end of the eighteenth century, and up to that time wall-paper was painted on small squares of hand-made paper, difficult to hang, disfigured by joints, and consequently costly; on this account wall-papers were slow in superseding the older modes of mural decoration, such as wood panelling, painting, tapestry, stamped leather, and printed cloth. A little work by Jackson, of Battersea, printed in London in 1744, gives some light on papers used at that time. He gives reduced copies of his designs, mostly taken from Italian pictures or antique sculpture during his residence in Venice. Instead of flowering patterns covering the walls, his designs are all pictures—landscapes, architectural scenes, or statues—treated as panels, with plain paper or painting between. They are all printed in oil, with wooden blocks worked with a rolling press, apparently an invention of his own. They are all in the worst possible taste, and yet are offered as an improvement on the Chinese papers then in vogue."

In 1586 there was in Paris a corporation called dominotiers, domino makers, which had the exclusive right to manufacture colored papers; and they were evidently not a new body. "Domino" was an Italian[30] word, used in Italy as early as the fifteenth century for marbled paper. French gentlemen, returning from Milan and Naples, brought back boxes or caskets lined with these papers, which were imitated in France and soon became an important article of trade. The foreign name was kept because of the prejudice in favor of foreign articles. But French taste introduced a change in the character of the ornament, preferring symmetrical designs to the hap-hazard effect of the marbling. They began then to print with blocks various arabesques, and to fill in the outlines with the brush.

In Furetiere's Dictionary, of the last quarter of the seventeenth century, dominotier is defined, "workman who makes marbled paper and other papers of all colors and printed with various figures, which the people used to call 'dominos'."

On March 15, 1787, a decree of the French King's Council of State declared that the art of painting and printing paper to be used in furnishings was a dependence of the governing board of the "Marchands-Papetiers-Dominotiere-Feuilletinere."

This domino-work was for a long time principally used by country folk and the humbler citizens of Paris to cover parts of their rooms and shops; but near the end of the seventeenth century there was hardly a house in Paris, however magnificent, that did not have some place adorned with some of this domino-work, with flowers, fruits, animals and small human figures. These pictures were often arranged in compartments. The dominotiers made paper tapestries also, and had the right to represent portraits, mythological scenes and Old and New Testament stories. At first they introduced written[31] explanations, but the letter printers thought this an infringement of their rights; therefore it was omitted.

We are told by Aumonier that little precise information is to be found concerning the domino papers. "Some were made from blocks of pear-tree wood, with the parts to be printed left in relief, like type. The designs were small pictures and in separate sheets, each subject complete to itself. They were executed in printing-ink by means of the ordinary printing-press. Some were afterwards finished by hand in distemper colors; others were printed in oil, gold-sized and dusted over with powdered colors, which gave them some resemblance to flock papers."

Much is said about flock paper, and many were the methods of preparing it. Here is one: "Flock paper, commonly called cloth paper, is made by printing the figures with an adhesive liquid, commonly linseed oil, boiled, or litharge. The surface is then covered with the flock, or woolen dust, which is produced in manufactories by the shearing of woolen cloths, and which is dyed of the requisite colors. After being agitated in contact with the paper, the flocks are shaken off, leaving a coating resembling cloth upon the adhesive surface of the figures." The manufacture of this paper was practised, both in England and France, early in the seventeenth century. I find in the Oxford Dictionary the following examples of the early mention of flock cloth, which was the thing that suggested to Le François his invention of flock paper:

Act I of Richard III., C. 8, preamble: "The Sellers of such course Clothes, being bare of Threde, usen for to powder the cast Flokkys of fynner Cloth[32] upon the same." Again in 1541, Act of Henry VIII., C. 18: "Thei—shall (not) make or stoppe any maner Kerseies with flocks."

"Flock, which is one of the most valuable materials used in paper staining, not only from its cost, but from its great usefulness in producing rich and velvety effects, is wool cut to a fine powder. The wool can be used in natural color or dyed to any tint. The waste from cloth manufactures furnished the chief supply, the white uniforms of the Austrian soldiery supplying a considerable portion."

Other substances have been tried, as ground cork, flock made from kids' and goats' hair, the cuttings of furs and feathers, wood, sawdust, and, lately, a very beautiful flock made of silk, which gives a magnificent effect, but is so expensive that it can only be used for "Tentures de luxe."

Mr. Aumonier says: "Until quite recently there were on the walls of some of the public rooms in Hampton Court Palace several old flock papers, which had been hung so long ago that there is now no official record of when they were supplied. They were of fine, bold design, giving dignity to the apartments, and it is greatly to be regretted that some of them have been lately replaced by a comparatively insignificant design in bronze, which already shows signs of tarnishing, and which will eventually become of an unsightly, dirty black. All decorators who love their art will regret the loss of these fine old papers, and will join with the writer in the hope that the responsible authorities will not disturb those that still remain, so long as they can be kept on the walls; and when that is no longer possible, that they[33] will have the designs reproduced in fac-simile, which could be done at a comparatively small cost.

"Mr. Crace, in his History of Paperhangings, says that by the combination of flock and metal, 'very splendid hangings' are produced; an opinion to which he gave practical expression some years afterwards when he was engaged in decorating the new House of Parliament, using for many of the rooms rich and sumptuous hangings of this character, especially designed by the elder Pugin, and manufactured for Mr. Crace from his own blocks."

In England, in the time of Queen Anne, paper staining had become an industry of some importance, since it was taxed with others for raising supplies "to carry on the present war"—Marlborough's campaign in the low countries against France. Clarence Cook, whom I am so frequently quoting because he wrote so much worth quoting, says:

"One of the pleasant features of the Queen Anne style is its freedom from pedantry, its willingness to admit into its scheme of ornamentation almost anything that is intrinsically pretty or graceful. We can, if we choose, paint the papers and stuffs with which we cover our walls with wreaths of flowers and festoons of fruits; with groups of figures from poetry or history; with grotesques and arabesques, from Rome and Pompeii, passed through the brains of Louis XIV's Frenchmen or of Anne's Englishmen; with landscapes, even, pretty pastorals set in framework of wreaths or ribbon, or more simply arranged like regular spots in rows of alternate subjects."

It may be interesting to remember that the pretty wall-papers of the days of Queen Anne and early Georges[34] were designed by nobody in particular, at a time when there were no art schools anywhere; and one can easily see that the wall-papers, the stuff-patterns and the furniture of that time are in harmony, showing that they came out of the same creative mould, and were the product of a sort of spirit-of-the-age.

Mica, powdered glass, glittering metallic dust or sand, silver dross, and even gold foil, were later used, and a silver-colored glimmer called cat-silver, all to produce a brilliant effect. This art was known long ago in China, and I am told of a Chinese paper, seen in St. Petersburg, which had all over it a silver-colored lustre.

Block printing and stencilling naturally belong to this subject, but, as my theme is "Old Time Wall Papers," and my book is not intended to be technical, or a book of reference as regards their manufacture, I shall not dwell on them.

Nor would it be wise to detail all the rival claimants for the honor of inventing a way of making wall-paper in rolls instead of small sheets; nor to give the names even of all the famous paper-makers. One, immortalized by Carlyle in his French Revolution, must be mentioned—Revillon, whose papers in water colors and in flock were so perfect and so extremely beautiful that Madame de Genlis said they cost as much as fine Gobelin tapestry. Revillon had a large factory in the Rue du Faubourg St. Antoine, Paris, and in 1788 was employing three hundred hands. He was urged to incite his workmen to head the Faubourg in open rebellion, but refused to listen; and angry at his inability to coerce this honorable man the envoy caused a false report to be spread about, that he intended to cut his wages one-half.

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This roused a furious mob, and everything was ruined, and he never recovered from the undeserved disaster.

Carlyle closes his description of the fatal riot with these words: "What a sight! A street choked up with lumber, tumult and endless press of men. A Paper-Warehouse eviscerated by axe and fire; mad din of revolt; musket volleys responded to by yells, by miscellaneous missiles, by tiles raining from roof and window, tiles, execrations and slain men!—There is an encumbered street, four or five hundred dead men; unfortunate Revillon has found shelter in the Bastille."

England advanced in the art of paper-making during the time the French were planning the Revolution, and English velvet papers became the fashion. In 1754 Mme. de Pompadour had her wardrobe and the passage that led to her apartments hung with English paper. In 1758 she had the bath-room of the Chateau de Champs papered with it, and others followed her example.

But in 1765 the importation of English papers—engraved, figured, printed, painted to imitate damasks, chintzes, tapestries, and so on—was checked by a heavy tax. So at this time papers were a precious and costly possession. They were sold when the owner was leaving a room, as the following advertisements will show:

Dec. 17, 1782. "To-let; large room, with mirror over the fire-place and paper which the owner is willing to sell."

Feb. 5, 1784. "To-let; Main body of a house, on the front, with two apartments, one having mirrors, woodwork and papers, which will be sold."

When the owner of the paper did not succeed in selling it, he took it away, as it was stretched on cloth[36] or mounted on frames. These papers were then often offered for sale in the Parisian papers; we find advertised in 1764, "The paperhangers for a room, painted green and white"; November 26, 1766, "A hanging of paper lined with muslin, valued at 12 Livres"; February 13, 1777, "For sale; by M. Hubert, a hanging of crimson velvet paper, pasted on cloth, with gilt mouldings"; April 17, 1783, "38 yards of apple-green paper imitating damask, 24 livres, cost 38."

By 1782, the use of wall-papers became so general that, from that time on, the phrase "decorated with wall-paper" frequently occurs in advertisements of luxurious apartments to let. Before this time, mention had commonly been made, in the same manner, of the woodwork and mirrors.

October 12, 1782, the Journal general de France advertised: "To let; two houses, decorated with mirrors and papers, one with stable for five horses, 2 carriage-houses, large garden and well, the other with three master's apartments, stable for 12 horses, 4 carriage-houses, etc." Oct. 28, 1782, "To let; pretty apartment of five rooms, second floor front, with mirrors, papers, etc." Feb. 24, 1783, "To let; rue Montmartre, first floor apartment, with antechamber; drawing-room, papered in crimson, with mouldings; and two bed-rooms, one papered to match, with two cellars."

Mme. du Bocage, in her Letters on England, Holland, and Italy, (1750) gives an account of Mrs. Montague's breakfast parties: "In the morning, breakfasts agreeably bring together the people of the country and strangers, in a closet lined with painted paper of Pekin, and furnished with the choicest movables of China.

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"Mrs. Montague added, to her already large house, 'the room of the Cupidons', which was painted with roses and jasmine, intertwined with Cupids, and the 'feather room,' which was enriched with hangings made from the plumage of almost every bird."

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[41]

WALL-PAPERS of expensive styles and artistic variety were brought to America as early as 1735. Before that time, and after, clay paint was used by thrifty housewives to freshen and clean the sooty walls and ceilings, soon blackened by the big open fires. This was prepared simply by mixing with water the yellow-gray clay from the nearest claybank.

In Philadelphia, walls were whitewashed until about 1745, when we find one Charles Hargrave advertising wall-paper, and a little later Peter Fleeson manufacturing paper-hangings and papir-maché mouldings at the corner of Fourth and Chestnut Streets.

Those who could not afford to import papers painted their walls, either in one color or stencilled in a simple pattern, or panelled, in imitation of French papers; each panel with its own picture, large or small. These attempts at decoration ranged with the taste and skill of the artist, from fruit and floral designs and patterns copied from India prints and imported china, to more elaborate[42] and often horrible presentments of landscapes and "waterscapes." The chimney breast, or projecting wall forming the chimney, received especial attention.

In my own farm-house, which was built in Colonial style in 1801 (with, as tradition says, forty pumpkin pies and two barrels of hard cider to cheer on the assisting neighbors), one of my first tasks was to have five or six layers of cheap papers dampened and scraped off. And, to my surprise, we found hand-painted flowers, true to nature and still extremely pretty, though of course scratched and faded after such heroic treatment—fuchsias in one room, carnation pinks in another, and in the front hall honeysuckle blossoms, so defaced that they suggested some of the animal tracks that Mr. Thompson-Seton copies in his books. What an amount of painstaking and skilled work all that implied! That was a general fashion at the time the house was built, and many such hand-paintings have been reported to me.

Mrs. Alice Morse Earle mentions one tavern parlor which she has seen where the walls were painted with scenes from a tropical forest. On either side of the fire-place sprang a tall palm tree. Coiled serpents, crouching tigers, monkeys, a white elephant, and every form of vivid-colored bird and insect crowded each other on the walls. And she speaks of a wall-paper on the parlor of the Washington Tavern at Westfield, Massachusetts, which gives the lively scenes of a fox chase.

Near Conway, New Hampshire, there is a cottage where a room can still be seen that has been most elaborately adorned by a local artist. The mountains are evenly scalloped and uniformly green, the sky evenly blue all the way round. The trees resemble those to be found[43] in a Noah's Ark, and the birds on them are certainly one-fourth as large as the trees.

The painted landscapes are almost impossible to find, but I hear of one room, the walls of which are painted with small landscapes, water scenes, various animals, and trees. A sympathetic explorer has discovered another in similar style at Westwood, Massachusetts, near Dedham.

In the old "Johnson House," Charlestown, New Hampshire, the door remains on the premises, with hatchet marks still visible, through which the Indians, "horribly fixed for war," dashed in pursuit of their trembling victims. The hinges of hoop iron and latch with stringhole beneath are intact. A portion of its surface is still covered with the paint of the early settlers, made of red earth mixed with skimmed milk.

A friend wrote me that her grandmother said that "before wall-paper became generally used, many well-to-do persons had the walls of the parlor—or keeping room as it was sometimes called—and spare room tinted a soft Colonial yellow, with triangles, wheels or stars in dull green and black for a frieze; and above the chair-rail a narrower frieze, same pattern or similar, done in stencilling, often by home talent.

"My great aunt used to tell me that when company was expected, the edge of the floor in the 'keeping room' was first sanded, then the most artistic one of the family spread it evenly with a birch broom, and with sticks made these same wheels and scallops around the edge of the room, and the never-missing pitcher of asparagus completed the adornment."

On the panels of a mantel, she remembers, an artist came from New Boston and painted a landscape,[44] while in the sitting-room, across the hall, a huge vase of gayly tinted flowers was painted over the mantel. On the mantel of another house was painted the Boston massacre. This was in existence only a few years ago.

Later came the black and white imitation of marble for the halls and stairs, and yellow floors with the stencil border in black. This was an imitation of the French. In Balzac's Pierrette is described a pretentious provincial house, of which the stairway was "painted throughout in imitation of yellow-veined black marble."

Madeleine Gale Wynne, in The House Beautiful, wrote most delightfully about "Clay, Paint and other Wall Furnishings," and I quote her vivid descriptions of the wall paintings she saw in Deerfield and Bernardston, Massachusetts.

"These wall paintings, like the embroideries, were derived from the India prints or the Chinese and other crockery. Whether the dweller in this far-off New England atmosphere was conscious of it or not, he was indebted to many ancient peoples for the way in which he intertwined his spray, or translated his flower and bud into a decorative whole.

"Odd and amusing are many of the efforts, and they have often taken on a certain individuality that makes a curious combination with the Eastern strain.

"An old house in Deerfield has the remains of an interesting wall, and a partition of another done in blue, with an oval picture painted over the mantel-tree. The picture was of a blue ship in full sail on a blue ocean.

"The other wall was in a small entry-way, and had an abundance of semi-conventionalized flowers done in red, black, and browns. The design was evidently painted by hand, and evolved as the painter worked. A[45] border ran round each doorway, while the wall spaces were treated separately and with individual care; the effect was pleasing, though crude. Tulips and roses were the theme.

"This house had at one time been used as a tavern, and there is a tradition that this was one of several public houses that were decorated by a man who wandered through the Connecticut Valley during Revolutionary times, paying his way by these flights of genius done in oil. Tradition also has it that this man had a past; whether he was a spy or a deserter from the British lines, or some other fly-from-justice body, was a matter of speculation never determined. He disappeared as he came, but behind him he left many walls decorated with fruit and flowers, less perishable than himself.

"We find his handiwork not only in Deerfield, but in Bernardston. There are rumors that there was also a wall of his painting in a tavern which stood on the border line between Massachusetts and Vermont. In Connecticut, too, there are houses that have traces of his work. In Bernardston, Massachusetts, there is still to be seen a room containing a very perfect specimen of wall painting which is attributed to him. This work may be of later date, but no one knows its origin.

"This design is very pleasing, not only because of its antiquity and associations, but because in its own way it is a beautiful and fitting decoration. The color tones are full, the figures quaintly systematic and showing much invention.

"The body of the wall is of a deep cream, divided into diamond spaces by a stencilled design, consisting of[46] four members in diamond shape; the next diamond is made up of a different set of diamonds, there being four sets in all; these are repeated symmetrically, so that a larger diamond is produced. Strawberries, tulips, and two other flowers of less pronounced individuality are used, and the colors are deliciously harmonized in spite of their being in natural tints, and bright at that. Now, this might have been very ugly—most unpleasing; on the contrary, it is really beautiful.

"There is both dado and frieze, the latter being an elaborate festoon, the former less good, made up of straggling palms and other ill considered and constructed growths. One suspects the dado to be an out-and-out steal from some chintz, while the tulips and strawberries bear the stamp of personal intimacy.

"The culminating act of imagination and art was arrived at on the chimney-breast decoration; there indeed do we strike the high-water mark of the decorator; he was not hampered either by perspective or probability.

"We surmise that Boston and its harbor is the subject; here are ships, horses and coaches, trees and road-ways, running like garlands which subdivide the spaces, many houses in a row, and finally a row of docile sheep that for a century have fed in unfading serenity at their cribs in inexplicable proximity to the base of the dwellings. All is fair in love, war, and decoration.

"The trees are green, the houses red, the sheep white, and the water blue; all is in good tone, and I wish that it had been on my mantel space that this renegade painter had put his spirited effort."

A friend told me of her vivid recollection of some frescoed portraits on the walls of the former home of a[47] prominent Quaker in Minneapolis. Her letter to a cousin who attends the Friends' Meeting there brought this answer: "I had quite a talk with Uncle Junius at Meeting about his old house. Unfortunately, the walls were ruined in a fire a few years ago and no photograph had ever been taken of them. The portraits thee asked about were in a bed-room. William Penn, with a roll in his hand (the treaty, I suppose) was on one side of a window and Elizabeth Fry on the other. These two were life size.

"Then, (tell it not in Gath!) there was a billiard room. Here Mercury, Terpsichore and other gay creatures tripped around the frieze, and there was also a picture of the temple in Pompeii and Minerva with her owl. In the sitting room on one side of the bay window was a fisher-woman mending her net, with a lot of fish about her. On the other side of the window another woman was feeding a deer.

"On the dining-room walls a number of rabbits were playing under a big fern and there was a whole family of prairie chickens, and ducks were flying about the ceiling. Uncle Junius said, 'It cost me a thousand dollars to have those things frescoed on, and they looked nice, too!' I suppose when the Quaker preachers came to visit he locked up the billiard room and put them in the room with William Penn and Elizabeth Fry. He seemed rather mortified about the other and said it would not do to go into a Quaker book, at all!"

This house was built about the middle of the nineteenth century, when Minneapolis was a new town; but it undoubtedly shows the influence of the old New England which was the genial Friend's boyhood home.[48] The scores of Quaker preachers and other visiting Friends who accepted the overflowing hospitality of this cheerfully frescoed house seem to have had none of the scruples of Massachusetts Friends of an earlier date. A lady sent me a strip of hideously ugly paper in squares, the colors dark brown and old gold. She wrote me that this paper was on the walls of the parlor of their house in Hampton, Massachusetts. The family were Friends; and once, when the Quarterly Meeting was held there, some of the Friends refused to enter their house, as the paper was too gay and worldly. And it actually had to be taken off!

After the clay paint and the hand painting came the small sheets or squares of paper, and again I was fortunate in finding in my adopted farm-house, in the "best room" upstairs, a snuff-brown paper of the "wine-glass" pattern that was made before paper was imported in rolls, and was pasted on the walls in small squares. The border looks as much like a row of brown cats sitting down as anything else. You know the family used to be called together to help cut out a border when a room was to be papered; but very few of these home-made borders are now to be found.

I was told of a lady in Philadelphia who grew weary of an old and sentimental pattern in her chamber, put on in small pieces and in poor condition, and begged her husband to let her take it off. But he was attached to the room, paper and all, and begged on his part that it might remain. She next visited queer old stores where papers were kept, and in one of them, in a loft, found enough of this very pattern, with Cupids and doves and roses, to re-paper almost the entire room. And it was[49] decidedly difficult so to match the two sides of the face of the little God of Love as to preserve his natural expression of roguishness and merry consciousness of his power.

It may interest some to learn just what drew my attention to the subject of old-time wall-papers. One, and an especially fine specimen, is associated with my earliest memories, and will be remembered to my latest day. For, although a native of New Hampshire, I was born at the foot of Mount Vesuvius, and there was a merry dance to the music of mandolin and tambourine round the tomb of Virgil on my natal morn. Some men were fishing, others bringing in the catch; farther on was a picnic party, sentimental youths and maidens eating comfits and dainties to the tender notes of a flute. And old Vesuvius was smoking violently. All this because the room in which I made my début was adorned with a landscape or scenic paper.

Fortunately, this still remains on the walls, little altered or defaced by the wear of years. When admiring it lately, the suggestion came to me to have this paper photographed at once, and also that of the Seasons in the next house; these were certainly too rare and interesting to be lost. It is singular that the only papers of this sort I had ever seen were in neighboring homes of two professors at Dartmouth College, and remarkable that neither has been removed: now I find many duplicates of these papers.

What a keen delight it was to me as a child to be allowed to go to Professor Young's, to admire his white hair, which I called "pitty white fedders," and to gaze at the imposing sleighing party just above the mantel, and at the hunters or the haymakers in the fields![50] A good collection is always interesting, from choice old copies of first editions to lanterns, cow-bells, scissors, cup-plates, fans or buttons; and I mourn that I did not think of securing photographs of quaint and antique papers years ago, for most of them have now disappeared.

Showing the beginnings of my collection to an amateur photographer, he was intensely interested, and said: "Why, I can get you a set as good as these! The house has been owned by one family for eighty-five years, and the paper was put on as long ago as that." And certainly his addition is most interesting. The scenes in one are French. You see a little play going on, such as we have been told in a recent magazine article they still have in France—a street show in which a whole family often take part. They appear as accompaniment to a fair or festival. The hole for the stove-pipe, penetrating the foliage, has a ludicrous effect, contrasting in abrupt fashion—the old and the new, the imposing and the practical.

This enthusiastic friend next visited Medfield, Massachusetts, where he heard there were several such papers, only to be told that they had just been scraped off and the rooms modernized.

Hearing of a fine example of scenic paper in the old Perry House at Keene, New Hampshire, I wrote immediately, lest that, too, should be removed, and through the kindness of absolute strangers can show an excellent representation of the Olympic games, dances, Greeks placing wreaths upon altars, and other scenes from Grecian life, well executed. These are grand conceptions; I hope they may never be vandalized by chisel and paste, but be allowed to remain as long as that historic house stands. They are beautifully preserved.

[51]

A brief magazine article on my new enthusiasm, illustrated with photographs of papers I knew about, was received with surprising interest. My mail-bag came crowded, and I was well-nigh "snowed in," as De Quincy put it, by fascinating letters from men and women who rejoiced in owning papers like those of my illustrations, or had heard of others equally fine and equally venerable, and with cordial invitations to journey here and there to visit unknown friends and study their wall-papers, the coloring good as new after a hundred years or more. It was in this unexpected and most agreeable way that I heard of treasures at Windsor, Vermont; Claremont, New Hampshire; Taunton, Massachusetts, and quaint old Nantucket, and was informed that my special paper, with the scenes from the Bay of Naples (represented so faithfully that one familiar with the Italian reality could easily recognize every one) was a most popular subject with the early purchaser and was still on the walls of a dozen or more sitting-rooms.

The Reverend Wallace Nutting, of Providence, whose fame as an artistic photographer is widespread, sent me a picture of a parlor in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, where he found this paper. Three women dressed in old-fashioned style, even to the arrangement of their hair, are seated at table, enjoying a cup of tea. An old tabby is napping cosily in a soft-cushioned chair. And above, on the right, Vesuvius is pouring forth the usual volumes of smoke. A fine old mahogany side-board, at the foot of the volcano, decorated with decanters and glasses large and small, presents an inviting picture.

The house at Hillsboro Bridge, New Hampshire, where Ex-Governor Benjamin Pierce lived for years, and[52] where his son, Franklin Pierce, passed a happy boyhood, has this paper, and several similar letters show how generally it was admired. Mrs. Lawrence, of Boston, wrote:

"I send by this mail a package of pictures, taken by my daughter, of the Italian wall-paper on her grandfather's old home in Exeter, N. H. The house is now owned by the Academy and used as a dormitory. The views which I enclose have never been published. We have two or three remarkable specimens of wall-paper made in India a hundred and fifty years ago; the strips are hanging on the wall, nailed up."

The Italian paper proved to be my old friend Vesuvius and his bay. An Exeter professor also wrote describing the same paper and adding translations of the Greek inscriptions on the monuments.

Friends would often write of such a wonderful specimen at some town or village. I would write to the address given and be told of this Bay of Naples paper again. They were all brought over and put on at about the same time.

One of the oldest houses in Windsor, Vermont, still has a charming parlor paper, with landscape and water, boats, castles, ruins and picturesque figures, which was imported and hung about 1810. This house was built by the Honorable Edward R. Campbell, a prominent Vermonter in his day, and here were entertained President Monroe and other notable visitors. Later the Campbell house was occupied for some years by Salmon P. Chase. It is now the home of the Sabin family.

A Boston antique dealer wrote me: "In an article of yours in The House Beautiful, you have a photograph of the paper of the old Perry House, Keene, N. H. We[53] want to say that we have in our possession here at this store, strung up temporarily, a paper with the same subject. It forms a complete scene, there being thirty pieces in attractive old shades of brown. We bought this from a family in Boston some little time ago, and it is said to have been made in France for a planter in New Orleans in or before 1800. We feel we would be excused in saying that this is the most interesting lot of any such thing in existence. It has been handed down from family to family, and they, apparently, have shown it, because the bottom ends of some of the sheets are considerably worn from handling. You understand this paper was never hung on the wall and it is just as it was originally made." He fairly raves over the beautiful rich browns and cream and "O! such trees!"

To my inquiry whether his price for this paper was really two thousand dollars, as I had heard, he replied, "We would be very sorry to sell the paper for two thousand dollars, for it is worth five thousand."

An artist who called to examine the paper is equally enthusiastic. He writes: "I was greatly impressed by the remarkably fine execution of the entire work. Doubtless it was printed by hand with engraved blocks. A large per cent of the shading, especially the faces of the charming figures, was surely done by hand, and all is the production of a superior artist. There are several sections, each perhaps three feet square, of such fine design, grouping, finish and execution of light and shade, as to make them easily samples of such exquisite nicety and comprehensive artistic work as to warrant their being framed.

"The facial expression of each of the many figures[54] is so true that it indicates the feelings and almost the thoughts of the person represented; there is remarkable individuality and surprising animation. I was forcibly struck with the inimitable perspective of the buildings and the entire landscape with which they are associated. Practically speaking, the buildings are of very perfect Roman architecture; there is, however, a pleasing venture manifested, where the artist has presented a little of the Greek work with here and there a trace of Egyptian, and perhaps of the Byzantine. These make a pleasing anachronism, such as Shakespeare at times introduced into his plays: a venture defended by Dr. Samuel Johnson, as well as other distinguished critics. The trees are done with an almost photographic truth and exactness. After a somewhat extended and critical examination of things of this kind in various parts of Europe, I do not hesitate to say that I have seen nothing of the kind that excels the work you have. What is quite remarkable about it, and more than all exhibits its truth to nature, it seems to challenge decision whether it shows to best advantage in strong daylight or twilight, by artificial light or that of the sun; an effect always present in nature, but not often well produced on paper or canvas. The successful venture to use so light a groundwork was much like that of Rubens, where he used a white sheet in his great painting, 'The Descent from the Cross.'"

Since the above description was written, this incomparable paper has passed into the hands of Mrs. Franklin R. Webber, 2nd, of Boston, who will either frame it, or in some other way preserve it as perfectly as possible.

The remarkable paper shown in Plate XLI and the three following plates were sent me by Miss Janet A.[55] Lathrop of Stockport-on-Hudson, New York. It is certainly one of the finest of the scenic papers still in existence. The scene is oriental, the costumes seeming both Turkish and Chinese. Temples and pagodas, a procession, a barge on the river and a gathering in a tea-house follow in succession about the room. All are printed by hand on rice paper, in gray tones. The paper is browned with age, but was cleaned and restored about a year ago and is exceedingly well preserved.

The house in which this paper is hung was built by Captain Seth Macy, a retired sea-captain, in 1815. The paper was put on in 1820. Captain Seth seems to have used up all his fortune in building his house, and in a few years he was forced to sell it. The name of "Seth's Folly" still clings to the place. In 1853 Miss Lathrop's father bought the house, and it has ever since been occupied by his family. By a singular coincidence, Mrs. Lathrop recognized the paper as the same as some on the old house at Albany in which she was born. Repeated inquiries have failed to locate any other example in America, and photographs have been submitted without avail to both domestic and foreign experts for identification. In the early seventies Miss Lathrop chanced to visit a hunting-lodge belonging to the King of Saxony at Moritzburg, near Dresden, and in the "Chinese room" she found a tapestry or paper exactly similar, from which the paper on her own walls may have been copied.

The two papers just described would seem to be the finest examples of continuous scenic papers still extant. I learn as this book goes to press that Mrs. Jack Gardner, of Boston, has a remarkable old geographical paper, in which the three old-world continents are represented.[56] I have been fortunate enough to secure, through the courtesy of Mrs. Russell Jarvis, a picture of the paper in her parlor at Claremont, New Hampshire. The Jarvis family have occupied the house since 1797. This is not a landscape, but consists of small pastoral scenes, placed at intervals and repeated regularly. The design is brown on a cream ground. It has a dado and a frieze in dark blue. It is hand made and all printed by hand, in squares of about eighteen inches, matched carefully. Mrs. Jarvis writes: "I had no idea that the photographer would take in so much each side of the corner, or I should have arranged the furniture differently. The picture I did not suppose was to appear is one of great interest and value. It is supposed to be a Rubens, and has hung there for over a hundred years. It was bought in 1791 in Boston, of a French gentleman from San Domingo, who, on the night of the insurrection there, escaped, saving but little else of his vast possessions. It had evidently been hastily cut from the frame. It represents the presentation of the head of the younger Cyrus to Tomyris, Queen of the Scythians. The coloring is fine, the figures very beautiful, and the satin and ermine of the Queen's dress extremely rich. If you look closely, you will see a sword lying on the piano. This is the one Sir William Pepperell was knighted with by King George the Second, in 1745, because of the Battle of Louisburg, and was given my husband's father by Sir William's grand-daughter, I believe."

You see how one photograph brings to you many valuable bits of information apart from the paper sought.

This letter, for example, with its accompanying photograph (see Plate XXII) leads one to the study of[57] history, art, and literature. The subject of the picture, aside from its supposed origin, is of interest.

The Scythians were Aryans much mixed with Mongol blood; they disappear from history about 100 B. C. Cyrus the younger, after subduing the eastern parts of Asia, was defeated by Tomyris, Queen of the Massagetae in Scythia. Tomyris cut off his head and threw it into a vessel filled with human blood, saying, as she did so, "There, drink thy fill."

Dante refers to this incident in his Purgatory, xii; and Sackville, in his Mirrour for Magistrates, 1587, says:

Here seems to be the place to speak more fully of the small scenes placed regularly at intervals. There is a great variety of pretty medallion pictures of this sort, as, alternating figures of a shepherdess with her crook reclining on a bank near a flock of sheep, and a boy studying at a desk, with a teacher standing near by.

Mr. Frank B. Sanborn writes: "The oldest paper I ever saw was in the parlor of President Weare, of Hampton Falls—a simple hunting scene, with three compartments; a deer above, a dog below, and a hunter with his horn below that. It was put on in 1737, when the house was built, and, I think, is there still. Colonel Whiting's house had a more elaborate and extensive scene—what the French called 'Montagnes Russe'—artificial[58] hills in a park, for sliding down, toboggan fashion, and a score of people enjoying them or looking on."

A good authority asserts that rolls of paper did not appear in this country until 1790, so that all these now mentioned must have been imported in square sheets. Notice the step forward—from white walls, through a clay wash, to hand painting, stencilling, small imported sheets, and, at last, to rolls of paper.

[61]

ESTHER Singleton, in her valuable and charming book on French and English Furniture, tells us that in the early Georgian period, from 1714 to 1754, the art of the Regency was on the decline, and "the fashionable taste of the day was for Gothic, Chinese and French decorations; and the expensive French wall-painting and silken hangings were imitated in wall-paper and the taste even spread to America." In 1737, the famous Hancock House was being built and, until it was demolished a few years ago (1863), it was the last of the great mansions standing that could show what the stately homes of old Boston were like. This house was built by Thomas Hancock, son of the Rev. John Hancock, the kitchen of whose house is now owned by the Lexington Historical Society.

On January 23, 1737-8, we find him writing from Boston to Mr. John Rowe, Stationer, London, as follows: "Sir, Inclosed you have the Dimensions of a Room for a Shaded Hanging to be done after the Same Pattern I have[62] sent per Captain Tanner, who will deliver it to you. It's for my own House and Intreat the favour of you to Get it Done for me to Come Early in the Spring, or as Soon as the nature of the Thing will admitt.

"The pattern is all was Left of a Room Lately Come over here, and it takes much in ye Town and will be the only paper-hanging for Sale here wh. am of opinion may Answer well. Therefore desire you by all means to get mine well Done and as Cheap as Possible and if they can make it more beautifull by adding more Birds flying here and there, with Some Landskips at the Bottom, Should like it well. Let the Ground be the Same Colour of the Pattern. At the Top and Bottom was a narrow Border of about 2 Inches wide wh. would have to mine. About three or four years ago my friend Francis Wilks, Esq., had a hanging Done in the Same manner but much handsomer Sent over here from Mr. Sam Waldon of this place, made by one Dunbar in Aldermanbury, where no doubt he, or some of his successors may be found. In the other part of these Hangings are Great Variety of Different Sorts of Birds, Peacocks, Macoys, Squirril, Monkys, Fruit and Flowers etc.

"But a greater Variety in the above mentioned of Mr. Waldon's and Should be fond of having mine done by the Same hand if to be mett with. I design if this pleases me to have two Rooms more done for myself. I Think they are handsomer and Better than Painted hangings Done in Oyle, so I Beg your particular Care in procuring this for me and that the patterns may be Taken Care of and Return'd with my goods."

John Adams writes in his Diary (1772): "Spent this evening with Mr. Samuel Adams at his house. Adams[63] was more cool, genteel, and agreeable than common; concealed and retained his passions, etc. He affects to despise riches, and not to dread poverty; but no man is more ambitious of entertaining his friends handsomely, or of making a decent, an elegant appearance than he.

"He has newly covered and glazed his house, and painted it very neatly, and has new papered, painted and furnished his rooms; so that you visit at a very genteel house and are very politely received and entertained."

Paper is the only material with which a man of but little means can surround himself with a decorative motive and can enjoy good copies of the expensive tapestries and various hangings which, until recently, have been within the reach of the wealthy only. The paper-hanger was not so much a necessity in the old days as now. The family often joined in the task of making the paste, cutting the paper and placing it on the walls. This was not beneath the dignity of George Washington, who, with the assistance of Lafayette, hung on the walls at Mount Vernon paper which he had purchased abroad.

The story goes that the good Martha lamented in the presence of Lafayette that she should be unable to get the new paper hung in the banquet room in time for the morrow's ball in honor of the young Marquis. There were no men to be found for such work. Lafayette at once pointed out to Mistress Washington that she had three able-bodied men at her service—General Washington, Lafayette himself and his aide-de-camp. Whereupon the company fell merrily to work, and the paper was hung in time for the ball. Not only did the Father of our Country fight our battles for us, but there is evidence that he gracefully descended to a more peaceful[64] level and gave us hints as to that valuable combination known to the world as flour paste.

There is in existence a memorandum in Washington's hand, which reads as follows:

"Upholsterer's directions:

"If the walls have been whitewashed over with glew water. If not—Simple and common paste is sufficient without any other mixture but, in either case, the Paste must be made of the finest and best flour, and free from lumps. The Paste is to be made thick and may be thinned by putting water to it.

"The Paste is to be put upon the paper and suffered to remain about five minutes to soak in before it is put up, then with a cloth press it against the wall, until all parts stick. If there be rinkles anywhere, put a large piece of paper thereon and then rub them out with cloth as before mentioned."

During the period when Mount Vernon was in private hands, the papers of Washington's day were removed. There is now on the upper hall a medallion paper which is reproduced from that which hung there at the time of the Revolution.

Benjamin Franklin was another of our great men who interested themselves in domestic details. In 1765 he was in London, when he received from his wife a letter describing the way in which she had re-decorated and furnished their home. Furniture, carpets and pictures were mentioned, and wall coverings as well. "The little south room I have papered, as the walls were much soiled. In this room is a carpet I bought cheap for its goodness, and nearly new.... The Blue room has the harmonica and the harpsichord, the gilt sconce, a card[65] table, a set of tea china, the worked chairs and screen—a very handsome stand for the tea kettle to stand on, and the ornamental china. The paper of the room has lost much of its bloom by pasting up." This blue room must have been the subject of further correspondence. Nearly two years later Franklin wrote to his wife:

"I suppose the room is too blue, the wood being of the same colour with the paper, and so looks too dark. I would have you finish it as soon as you can, thus: paint the wainscot a dead white; paper the walls blue, and tack the gilt border round the cornice. If the paper is not equally coloured when pasted on, let it be brushed over again with the same colour, and let the papier maché musical figures be tacked to the middle of the ceiling. When this is done, I think it will look very well."

There are many old houses in New England and the Middle States which are of historic interest, and in some of these the original paper is still on the walls and in good preservation, as in the Dorothy Quincy house at Quincy, Massachusetts. The Dorothy Quincy house is now owned by the Colonial Dames of Massachusetts, who have filled it with beautiful colonial furniture and other relics of Dorothy Q's day. The papers on all the walls are old, but none so early as that on the large north parlor (Plate XXIX), which was imported from Paris to adorn the room in which Dorothy Quincy and John Hancock were to have been married in 1775. Figures of Venus and Cupid made the paper appropriate to the occasion.

"But the fortunes of war," says Katharine M. Abbott in her Old Paths and Legends of New England, "upset the best of plans, and her wedding came about very quietly at the Thaddeus Burr house in Fairfield. Owing to the[66] prescription on Hancock's head, they were forced to spend their honeymoon in hiding, as the red-coats had marked for capture this elegant, cocked-hat 'rebel' diplomatist of the blue and bluff. Dorothy Quincy Hancock, the niece of Holmes's 'Dorothy Q.,' is a fascinating figure in history. Lafayette paid her a visit of ceremony and pleasure at the Hancock house on his triumphal tour, and no doubt the once youthful chevalier and reigning belle flung many a quip and sally over the teacups of their eventful past."

The Hancock-Clarke house, in Lexington, Massachusetts, is a treasure house of important relics, besides files of pamphlets, manuscripts and printed documents, portraits, photographs, furniture, lanterns, canteens, pine-tree paper currency, autographs, fancy-work—in fact almost everything that could be dug up. There is also a piece of the original paper on the room occupied by Hancock and Adams on April 18, 1775. But the bit of paper and the reproduction are copyrighted, and there is no more left of it. It is a design of pomegranate leaves, buds, flowers and fruits—nothing remarkable or attractive about it. I have a small photograph of it, which must be studied through a glass.

In the sitting-room the paper is a series of arches, evidently Roman, a foot wide and three feet high. The pillars supporting the arches are decorated with trophies—shields, with javelins, battle-axes and trumpets massed behind. The design is a mechanical arrangement of urn and pedestal; there are two figures leaning against the marble, and two reclining on the slab above the urn. One of these holds a trumpet, and all the persons are wearing togas. The groundwork of color in each panel[67] is Roman red; all the rest is a study in black and white lines. Garlands droop at regular intervals across the panels.

The paper in the Lafayette room at the Wayside Inn, South Sudbury, Massachusetts, is precious only from association. The inn was built about 1683, and was first opened by David Howe, who kept it until 1746. It was then kept by his three sons in succession, one son, Lyman Howe, being the landlord when Longfellow visited there and told the tale of Paul Revere's ride. It was renovated under the management of Colonel Ezekiel Howe, 1746-1796, and during that time the paper was put on the Lafayette room.

Several important personages are known to have occupied this room, among them General Lafayette, Judge Sewall, Luigi Monti, Doctor Parsons, General Artemus Ward. The house was first known as Howe's in Sudbury, or Horse Tavern, then as the Red Horse Tavern; and in 1860 was immortalized by Longfellow as The Wayside Inn.

"The landlord of Longfellow's famous Tales was the dignified Squire Lyman Howe, a justice of the peace and school committee-man, who lived a bachelor, and died at the inn in 1860—the last of his line to keep the famous hostelry. Besides Squire Howe, the only other real characters in the Tales who were ever actually at the inn were Thomas W. Parsons, the poet; Luigi Monti, the Sicilian, and Professor Daniel Treadwell, of Harvard, the theologian, all three of whom were in the habit of spending the summer months there. Of the other characters, the musician was Ole Bull, the student was Henry Ware Wales, and the Spanish Jew was Israel Edrehi. Near the room in which Longfellow stayed is the ball-room[68] with the dais at one end for the fiddlers. But the polished floor no longer feels the pressure of dainty feet in high-heeled slippers gliding over it to the strains of contra-dance, cotillion, or minuet, although the merry voices of summer visitors and jingling bells of winter sleighing parties at times still break the quiet of the ancient inn."

Judge Sewall, in his famous diary, notes that he spent the night at Howe's in Sudbury—there being also a Howe's Tavern in Marlboro. Lafayette, in 1824, spent the night there and, as Washington passed over this road when he took command of the army at Cambridge, it is more than likely that he also stopped there, as Colonel Howe's importance in this neighborhood would almost demand it. Washington passed over this road again when on his tour of New England, and then Colonel Howe was the landlord and squire, as well as colonel of a regiment.

Burgoyne stopped there, a captive, on his way from Ticonderoga to Boston; and, as this was the most popular stage route to New York city, Springfield and Albany, those famous men of New England—Otis, Adams, Hancock, and many others—were frequent guests. A company of horse patrolled the road, and tripped into the old bar for their rum and home-brewed ale. It is worth recording that Agassiz, in his visits to the house, examined the ancient oaks near the inn, and pronounced one of them over a thousand years old. Edna Dean Proctor refers to them in her poem:

I have a photograph of the famous King's Tavern, where Lafayette was entertained, and a small piece of the[69] paper of the dining-room. This tavern was at Vernon, Connecticut, (now known as Rockville,) on the great Mail Stage route from New York to Boston. It was noted for its waffles, served night and morning, and the travellers sometimes called it "Waffle Tavern." It was erected by Lemuel King, in 1820. Now it is used as the Rockville town farm. The noted French wall-paper on the dining-room, where Lafayette was entertained, represented mythological scenes. There was Atlas, King of the remote West and master of the trees that bore the golden apples; and Prometheus, chained to the rock, with the water about him. The paper was imported in small squares, which had to be most carefully pasted together.

This treasured paper, with its rather solemn colors of grey and black, and its amazing number of mythological characters, was stripped from the walls and consumed in a bonfire by an unappreciative and ignorant person who had control of the place. A lady rescued a few pieces and pasted them on a board. She has generously sent me a photograph of one of the panels. She writes me pathetically of the woodsy scenes, water views, mountains, cascades, and castles, with classic figures artistically arranged among them. There seems to have been a greater variety than is usual, from a spirited horse, standing on his hind legs on a cliff, to a charming nymph seated on a rock and playing on a lyre. Below all these scenes there was a dado of black and grey, with scrolls and names of the beings depicted—such names as Atlas, Atlantis, Ariadne, Arethusa, Adonis, Apollo, Andromache, Bacchus, Cassandra, Cadmus, Diana, Endymion, Juno, Jupiter, Iris, Laocoön, Medusa, Minerva, Neptune, Pandora, Penelope, Romulus, Sirius, Thalia, Theseus, Venus,[70] Vulcan, and many others were "among those present." Below these names came a dado of grassy green, with marine views at intervals.

Whether Lafayette noticed and appreciated all this, history telleth not. After his sumptuous repast a new coach was provided to convey him from King's Tavern to Hartford, and it was drawn by four white horses.

On a boulder in Lafayette Park, near by, is this inscription:

"In grateful memory of General Lafayette, whose love of liberty brought him to our shores, to dedicate his life and fortune to the cause of the Colonies.

"The Sabra Trumbull Chapter, D. A. R., erected this monument near the Old King's Tavern, where he was entertained in 1824."

The General Knox mansion, called "Montpelier," at Thomaston, Maine, is full of interest to all who care for old-time luxury as seen in the homes of the wealthy. General Knox was Washington's first Secretary of War. Samples of paper have been sent me from there. One had a background of sky-blue, on which were wreaths, with torches, censers with flames above, and two loving birds, one on the nest and the mate proudly guarding her—all in light brown and gray, with some sparkling mineral or tiniest particles of glass apparently sprinkled over, which produced a fascinating glitter, and a raised, applique effect I have never observed before. This was on the dining-room of the mansion. In the "gold room" was a yellow paper—as yellow as buttercups.

Still another, more unusual, was a representation of a sea-port town, Gallipoli, of European Turkey; armed men are marching; you see the water and picturesque[71] harbor, and Turkish soldiers in boats. The red of the uniforms brightens the pictures; the background is gray, and the views are enclosed in harmonious browns, suggesting trees and rocks. This paper came in small pieces, before rolls were made. Think of the labor of matching all those figures! "Gallipoli" is printed at the bottom.

I am assured by a truthful woman from Maine that the halls of this house were adorned with yellow paper with hunting scenes "life-size," and I don't dare doubt or even discuss this, for what a woman from that state knows is not to be questioned. It can't be childish imagination. Moreover, I have corroborative evidence from another veracious woman in the South, who, in her childhood, saw human figures of "life size" on a paper long since removed.

I freely confess that I had never heard of this distinguished General Knox and his palatial residence; but a composition from a little girl was shown me, which gives a good idea of the house:

"In the year 1793, General Knox sent a party of workmen from Boston to build a summer residence on the bank of the Georges River. The mansion was much like a French chateau, and was often so called by visitors.

"The front entrance faced the river. The first story was of brick, and contained the servants' hall, etc. The second floor had nine rooms, the principal of which was the oval room, into which the main entrance opened. There were two large windows on either side of the door, and on opposite sides were two immense fire-places. This room was used as a picture gallery, and contained many[72] ancient portraits. It had also a remarkable clock. It was high, and the case was of solid mahogany. The top rose in three points and each point had a brass ball on the top. The face, instead of the usual Roman numbers, had the Arabic 1, 2, 3, etc. There were two small dials. On each side of the case were little windows, showing the machinery. Between the two windows on one side of the room was a magnificent mahogany book-case, elaborately trimmed with solid silver, which had belonged to Louis XIV. and was twelve feet long.

"The mansion measured ninety feet across, and had on either side of the oval room two large drawing-rooms, each thirty feet long. There were twenty-eight fire-places in the house. Back of the western drawing-room was a library. This was furnished with beautiful books of every description, a large number being French. On the other side was a large china closet. One set of china was presented to General Knox by the Cincinnati Society. The ceiling was so high that it was necessary to use a step-ladder to reach the china from the higher shelves. Back of the oval room was a passage with a flight of stairs on each side, which met at the top. Above, the oval room was divided into two dressing-rooms. The bedsteads were all solid mahogany, with silk and damask hangings. One room was called the 'gold room,' and everything in it, even the counterpane, was of gold color. The doors were mahogany, and had large brass knobs and brass pieces extending nearly to the centre. The carpets were all woven whole.

"The house outside was painted white, with green blinds, though every room was furnished with shutters inside. A little in the rear of the mansion extended a number of out-buildings, in the form of a crescent,[73] beginning with the stable on one side, and ending with the cook house on the other. General Knox kept twenty saddle horses and a number of pairs of carriage horses. Once there was a gateway, surmounted by the American Eagle, leading into what is now Knox Street. 'Montpelier,' as it was called, had many distinguished visitors every summer."

I noticed in a recent paper the report of an old-time game supper, participated in by ninety prominent sportsmen at Thomaston, Maine, following the custom inaugurated by General Knox for the entertainment of French guests.

It was through hearing of the Knox house that I learned of a "death room." There was one over the eastern dining-room. These depressing rooms had but one window, and the paper was dark and gloomy—white, with black figures, and a deep mourning frieze. Benches were ranged stiffly around the sides, and there were drawers filled with the necessities for preparing a body for burial. Linen and a bottle of "camphire" were never forgotten. There the dead lay till the funeral. I can shiver over the intense gruesomeness of it. How Poe or Hawthorne could have let his inspired imagination work up the possibilities of such a room! A skeleton at the feast is a slight deterrent from undue gaiety, compared with this ever-ready, sunless apartment.

This reminds me that I read the other day of a "deadly-lively" old lady, who, having taken a flat in the suburban depths of Hammersmith, England, stipulated before signing her lease that the landlord should put black wall-paper on the walls of every room except the[74] kitchen. Possibly she had a secret sorrow which she wished to express in this melodramatic fashion. But why except the culinary department? We have been hearing a good deal lately about the effect of color on the nerves and temperament generally. A grim, undertaker-like tone of this kind would no doubt induce a desired melancholy, and if extended to the region of the kitchen range, might have furthered the general effect by ruining the digestion.

A writer in a recent number of the Decorator's and Painter's Magazine, London, says: "An interview has just taken place with a 'a well-known wall-paper manufacturer,' who, in the course of his remarks, informed the representative of the Morning Comet that black wall-papers were now all the rage. 'You would be surprised,' he said, 'how little these papers really detract from the lightness of a room, the glossiness of their surface compensating almost for the darkness of their shade;' and upon this score there would seem to be no reason why a good pitch paper should not serve as an artistic decorative covering for the walls of a drawing-room or a 'dainty' boudoir.

"It has been generally accepted that highly-glazed surfaces render wall-papers objectionable to the eye, and that they are therefore only fit for hanging in sculleries, bath-rooms and the like, where sanitary reasons outweigh decorative advantages. Very probably the gentleman who recommends black papers for walls would also recommend their use for ceilings, so that all might be en suite, and the effect would undoubtedly be added to, were the paintwork also of a deep, lustrous black, whilst—it may be stretching a point, but there is nothing like being consistent and thorough—the windows might at the same time be 'hung' in harmony with walls and ceilings. Coffin trestles with elm[75] boards would make an excellent table, and what better cabinets for bric-a-brac (miniature skeletons, petrified death's-head moths, model tombstones and railed vaults, and so on) than shelved coffins set on end? Plumes might adorn the mantel-shelf, and weeds and weepers festooned around skulls and crossbones would sufficiently ornament the walls without the aid of pictures, whilst the fragments from some dis-used charnel-house might be deposited in heaps in the corners of the apartment."

The old governors often indulged in expensive and unusual wall-papers. The Governor Gore house at Waltham, Massachusetts, had three, all of which I had photographed. The Gore house, until recently the home of Miss Walker, is one of the most beautiful in Massachusetts, and was an inheritance from her uncle, who came into possession of the property in 1856. Before Miss Walker's death, she suggested that the estate be given to the Episcopal Church in Waltham for a cathedral or a residence for the bishop.

The place is known as the Governor Gore estate, and is named for Christopher Gore, who was governor of Massachusetts in 1799. It covers nearly one hundred and fifty acres of gardens, woodlands and fields. The present mansion was erected in 1802 and replaces the one destroyed by fire.

The mansion is a distinct pattern of the English country house, such as was built by Sir Christopher Wren, the great eighteenth century architect. It is of brick construction. In the interior many of the original features have been retained, such as the remarkable "Bird of[76] Paradise" paper in the drawing-room. All the apartments are very high ceiled, spacious and richly furnished. Some of Governor Gore's old pieces of furniture, silver and china are still in use.

The Badger homestead, in Old Gilmanton, was the home of Colonel William Badger, Governor of New Hampshire in 1834 and 1835, and descended from a long line of soldierly, patriotic and popular men. Fred Myron Colby sketched the home of the Badgers in the Granite Monthly for December, 1882:

"Gov. Badger was a tall, stately man, strong, six feet in height, and at some periods of his life weighed nearly three hundred pounds. He was active and stirring his whole life. Though a man of few words, he was remarkably genial. He had a strong will, but his large good sense prevented him from being obstinate. He was generous and hospitable, a friend to the poor, a kind neighbor, and a high-souled, honorable Christian gentleman. The grand old mansion that he built and lived in has been a goodly residence in its day. Despite its somewhat faded majesty, there is an air of dignity about the ancestral abode that is not without its influence upon the visitor. It is a house that accords well with the style of its former lords; you see that it is worthy of the Badgers. The grounds about its solitary stateliness are like those of the 'old English gentlemen.' The mansion stands well in from the road; an avenue fourteen rods long and excellently shaded leads to the entrance gate. There is an extensive lawn in front of the house, and a row of ancient elms rise to guard, as it were, the tall building with its hospitable portal in the middle, its large windows, and old, moss-covered roof. The house faces the southwest, is two and a half[77] stories high, and forty-four by thirty-six feet on the ground.

"As the door swings open we enter the hall, which is ten by sixteen feet. On the left is the governor's sitting-room, which occupied the southeast corner of the house, showing that Gov. Badger did not, like Hamlet, dread to be too much 'i' the sun.' It is not a large room, only twenty by sixteen feet, yet it looks stately. In this room the governor passed many hours reading and entertaining his guests. In it is the antique rocking-chair that was used by the governor on all occasions. A large fire-place, with brass andirons and fender, is on one side, big enough to take in half a cord of wood at a time. Near by it stood a frame on which were heaped sticks of wood, awaiting, I suppose, the first chilly evening. It must be a splendid sight to see those logs blazing, and the firelight dancing on the old pictures and the mirror and the weapons on the walls.

"The most noticeable thing in the room is the paper upon the walls. It was bought by the governor purposely for this room, and cost one hundred dollars in gold. It is very thick, almost like strawboard, and is fancifully illustrated with all sorts of pictures—landscapes, marine views, court scenes, and other pageants. It will afford one infinite amusement to study the various figures. On one side is a nautical scene. An old-fashioned galleon, such a one as Kidd the pirate would have liked to run afoul of, is being unloaded by a group of negroes. Swarthy mariners, clad in the Spanish costume of the seventeenth century,—long, sausage-shaped hose, with breeches pinned up like pudding bags and fringed at the bottom, boots with wide, voluminous tops, buff coats with sleeves slashed[78] in front, and broad-brimmed Flemish beaver hats, with rich hat-bands and plumes of feathers—are watching the unlading, and an old Turk stands near by, complaisant and serene, smoking his pipe. On the opposite wall there is a grand old castle, with towers and spires and battlements. In the foreground is a fountain, and a group of gallants and ladies are promenading the lawn. One lady, lovely and coquettish, leans on the arm of a cavalier, and is seemingly engrossed by his conversation, and yet she slyly holds forth behind her a folded letter in her fair white hand which is being eagerly grasped by another gallant—like a scene from the Decameron. In the corner a comely maiden in a trim bodice, succinct petticoat and plaided hose, stands below a tall tree, and a young lad among the branches is letting fall a nest of young birds into her extended apron. The expression on the boy's face in the tree and the spirited protest of the mother bird are very graphically portrayed.

"The loveliest scene of all is that of a bay sweeping far into the land; boats and ships are upon the tide; on the shore, rising from the very water's edge, is a fairy-like, palatial structure, with machicolated battlements, that reminds one of the enchanted castle of Armida. Under the castle walls is assembled a gay company. A cavalier, after the Vandyke style, is playing with might and main upon a guitar, and a graceful, full-bosomed, lithe-limbed Dulcinea is dancing to the music in company with a gaily dressed gallant. It is the Spanish fandango. Another scene is a charming land and water view with no prominent figures in it.

"Upon the mantel are several curiosities, notably a fragment of the rock on which Rev. Samuel Hidden[79] was ordained at Tamworth, September 12, 1792, several silhouettes of the various members of the Badger family, and the silver candlesticks, tray and snuffers used by Mrs. Governor Badger. Suspended above, upon the wall, are a pair of horse pistols, a dress sword and a pair of spurs. These were the Governor's, which were used by him in the war of 1812, and also when he was sheriff of the county. The sword has quite a romantic history. It was formerly General Joseph Badger's, who obtained it in the following manner: When a lieutenant in the army, near Crown Point and Lake Champlain, just after the retreat from Canada, in 1777, Badger undertook, at the desire of General Gates, to obtain a British prisoner. With three picked men he started for the British camp at St. John's. Arriving in the neighborhood, he found a large number of the officers enjoying themselves at a ball given by the villagers. One of the Britons, in full ball dress, they were fortunate enough to secure, and took him to their boat. Badger then changed clothes with the officer, returned to the ball, danced with the ladies, hobnobbed with the officers, and gained much valuable information as to the movements of the British army. Before morning light he returned in safety with his prisoner to Crown Point, where he received the commendations of the commanding general for his bravery. The officer's sword he always kept, and is the same weapon that now hangs on the wall."

Mrs. Joseph Badger, whose husband was the oldest son of Governor William Badger (both, alas! now dead), wrote most kindly to me about the wall-paper, and sent me a picture of it. And she said: "The homestead was built in 1825 by Ex-Gov. William Badger, and the paper[80] you inquire about was hung that year. He was at Portsmouth, N. H., attending court, and seeing this paper in a store, liked it very much, and ordered enough to paper the sitting-room, costing fifty dollars. He did not have enough money with him to pay for it, but they allowed him to take it home, and he sent the money back by the stage driver, who laid it down on the seat where he drove, and the wind blew it away, never to be found, so he had to pay fifty dollars more; at least, so says tradition. The paper is quite a dark brown, and is in a good state of preservation and looks as though it might last one hundred years longer."

In a valuable book, entitled Some Colonial Mansions and Those Who Lived in Them, edited by Thomas Allen Glennand, and published in 1898, is a picture of the wall-paper at the Manor House, on page 157 of Volume I, in the chapter which relates to the Patroonship of the Van Rensselaers and the magnificent mansion. This was built in 1765, commenced and finished (except the modern wings) by Stephen Van Rensselaer, whose wife was the daughter of Philip Livingston, a signer of the Declaration of Independence.

"Seldom has a house a more splendid history, or romantic origin, than this relic of feudal splendor and colonial hospitality. The house is approached from the lodge-gate through an avenue shaded by rows of ancient trees. The entrance hall is thirty-three feet wide, and is decorated with the identical paper brought from Holland at the time the house was built, having the appearance of old fresco-painting."

The picture which follows this description is too small to be satisfactorily studied without a magnifying[81] glass, but the paper must be impressive as a whole. Imposing pillars on the left, perhaps all that remains of a grand castle; in front of them large blocks of stone with sculptured men and horses; at the right of these a pensive, elegant creature of the sterner sex gazing at a mammoth lion couchant on a square pedestal. Beyond the lion, a picturesque pagoda on a high rock, and five more human figures, evidently put in to add to the interest of the foreground. This square is surrounded with a pretty wreath, bedecked with flowers, birds and shells.

On either side of the hall were apartments some thirty feet wide; the great drawing-rooms, the state bed-room and the spacious library, in which the bookcases of highly polished wood occupied at least seventy feet of wall-space. All of the ceilings are lofty, and fine old wood carvings abounded on every side. Mr. William Bayard Van Rensselaer of Albany still possesses the handsome paper taken from one of these rooms, with four large scenes representing the seasons. The house was demolished only a few years ago.

I notice that almost all these mansions had walls of wood, either plain or paneled in broad or narrow panels, and simply painted with oil-paint of pure white or a cream yellow; and a Southern gentleman, whose ancestors lived in one of these historic homes, tells me that the Southern matrons were great housekeepers, and these white wood walls were thoroughly scrubbed at least three times yearly, from top to bottom.

In Part II of the history of the Carters of Virginia, we read that the duties of Robert Carter as councillor brought him to Williamsburg for a part of the year, and in 1761 he moved, with his family, from "Nomini Hall"[82] to the little Virginia capital, where he lived for eleven years. We know, from the invoices sent to London, how the Councillor's home in the city was furnished. The first parlor was bright with crimson-colored paper; the second had hangings ornamented by large green leaves on a white ground; and the third, the best parlor, was decorated with a finer grade of paper, the ground blue, with large yellow flowers. A mirror was to be four feet by six and a half, "the glass to be in many pieces, agreeable to the present fashion," and there were marble hearth-slabs, wrought-brass sconces and glass globes for candles, Wilton carpets and other luxuries. The mantels and wainscoting were especially fine.

The paper on the hall of Martin Van Buren's home at Kinderhook, New York, is said to have been interesting; but the present owners have destroyed it, being much annoyed by sightseers.

In the reception room of the Manor House of Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, Maryland, and in the state chamber, where Washington slept (a frequent and welcome guest at Doughoregan Manor) were papers, both with small floral patterns.

In New York and Albany paper-hanging was an important business by 1750 and the walls of the better houses were papered before the middle of the century. But in the average house the walls were not papered in 1748. A Swedish visitor says of the New York houses at that time, "The walls were whitewashed within, and I did not anywhere see hangings, with which the people in this country seem in general to be little acquainted. The walls were quite covered with all sorts of drawings and pictures in small frames."

[85]

THE wall-papers of a century ago did have distinct ideas and earnest meaning; a decided theme, perhaps taken from mythology, as the story of Cupid and Psyche, on one of the most artistic of the early panelled papers, to print which we read that fifteen hundred blocks were used. There were twelve panels, each one showing a scene from the experiences of the "Soul Maiden."

You remember that Venus, in a fit of jealousy, ordered Cupid to inspire Psyche with a love for the most contemptible of all men, but Cupid was so stricken with her beauty that he himself fell in love with her. He accordingly conveyed her to a charming spot and gave her a beautiful palace where, unseen and unknown, he visited her every night, leaving her as soon as the day began to dawn. Curiosity destroyed her happiness, for her envious sisters made her believe that in the darkness of night she was embracing some hideous monster. So once, when Cupid was asleep, she drew near to him with a lamp and, to her amazement, beheld the[86] most handsome of the gods. In her excitement of joy and fear, a drop of hot oil fell from her lamp upon his shoulder. This awoke Cupid, who censured her for her distrust and escaped. Then came long tribulations and abuse from Venus, until at last she became immortal, and was united to her lover forever. As you know, Psyche represents the human soul, purified by passions and misfortunes and thus prepared for the enjoyment of true and pure happiness.

From this accident, Ella Fuller Maitland has drawn for us—

A SPECIAL PLEADER

Another mythologic story is grandly depicted in a paper in the residence of Dr. John Lovett Morse, at Taunton, Mass. (Plates LXV to LXX.) This paper was described to me as illustrating the fifth book of Virgil's Æneid. When the handsome photographs came, we tried to verify them. But a reading of the entire Æneid failed to identify any of them, except that the one shown in Plate LXIX might be intended to represent the Trojan women burning the ships of Æneas. Who were the two personages leaping from the cliff? Virgil did not mention them.[87]

A paper in Country Life in America for April, 1905, describing the "Hermitage," Andrew Jackson's home near Nashville, Tennessee, spoke of the "unique" paper on the lower hall, depicting the adventures of Ulysses on the Island of Calypso. The illustration showed the same scenes that we had been hunting for in Virgil. The caption stated that it "was imported from Paris by Jackson. It pictures the story of Ulysses at the Island of Calypso. There are four scenes, and in the last Calypso's maidens burn the boat of Ulysses."

So we turned to the Odyssey. There again we were disappointed. Nobody jumps off cliffs in the Odyssey, Ulysses' boat is not burned, neither does Cupid, who appeared in every photograph, figure in the scenes between Ulysses and Calypso.

Next we took to the mythologies; and in one we found a reference to Fenelon's Adventures of Telemachus, which sends Telemachus and Mentor to Calypso's island in search of Ulysses, and describes their escape from the goddess's isles and wiles by leaping into the sea and swimming to a vessel anchored near. Here at last were our two cliff jumpers! And in long-forgotten Telemachus was found every scene depicted on the walls.

It is a strange commentary on the intellectual indolence of the average human mind, that these two remarkable sets of paper should so completely have lost their identity, and that the misnomers given them by some forgetful inhabitant should in each case have been accepted without question by those who came after him. Other owners of this paper have known what the[88] scenes really were; for I have had "Telemachus paper" reported, from Kennebunk, Maine, and from the home of Mr. Henry DeWitt Freeland at Sutton, Massachusetts. The paper is evidently of French origin, and is mentioned as a Parisian novelty by one of Balzac's characters in The Celibates, the scene of which was laid about 1820.

In the Freeland house at Sutton, there are also some scenes from Napoleon's campaign in Egypt. An inscription reads, "Le 20 mars, 1800, 100,000 Francais commandu par le brave Kleber ont vancu 200,000 Turcs, dans le plaines de l'Heliopili."

Among the historical papers, we have "Mourning at the Tomb of Washington," and Lord Cornwallis presenting his sword to Washington. The former was a melancholy repetition of columns and arches, each framing a monument labelled "Sacred to Washington," surmounted by an urn and disconsolate eagle, and supported on either side by Liberty and Justice mourning. Crossed arms and flags in the foreground, and a circular iron fence about the monument completed the picture, which was repeated in straight rows, making with its somber gray and black the most funereal hall and stairway imaginable.

Papers representing places with truthful details were numerous and popular, as "The Bay of Naples," "The Alhambra," "Gallipoli," "On the Bosporus." A striking paper represents the River Seine at Paris. This paper has a brilliant coloring and the scenes are carried entirely round the room; nearly all the principal buildings in Paris are seen. On one side of the room you will notice the Column Vendôme, which shows that the[89] paper was made after 1806. The horses in the arch of the Carousel are still in place. As these were sent back to Venice in 1814, the paper must have been made between these dates.

On the walls of a house in Federal Street, which was once occupied by H. K. Oliver, who wrote the hymn called "Federal Street," is the River Seine paper with important public buildings of Paris along its bank; several other houses have this same paper, and half a dozen duplicates have been sent me from various parts of New England.

I have heard of a paper at Sag Harbor, Long Island, in which old New York scenes were pictured, but of this I have not been fortunate enough to secure photographs.

Certain towns and their neighborhoods are particularly rich in interesting old papers, and Salem, Massachusetts, certainly deserves honorable mention at the head of the list. That place can show more than a score of very old papers in perfect condition to-day, and several houses have modern paper on the walls that was copied from the original paper.

One old house there was formerly owned by a retired merchant, and he had the entire ceiling of the large cupola painted to show his wharves and his ships that sailed from this port for foreign lands.

Another fine house has a water color painting on the walls, done to look like paper; this is one hundred and seventy-five years old.

A curious paper is supposed to be an attempt to honor the first railroad. This is in bright colors, with lower panels in common gray tints. The friend who obtained this for me suggests that the artist did not know[90] how to draw a train of cars, and so filled up the space ingeniously with a big bowlder. This is on the walls of a modest little house, and one wonders that an expensive landscape paper should be on the room. But the owner of the house was an expressman and was long employed by Salemites to carry valuable bundles back and forth from Boston. A wealthy man who resided in Chestnut Street was having his house papered during the rage for landscape papers, and this person carried the papers down from Boston so carefully that the gentleman presented him with a landscape paper of his own, as a reward for his interest. Now the mansion has long since parted with its foreign landscapes, but such care was taken of the humble parlor that its paper is still intact and handsome; it is more than seventy-five years old.

A fine French paper shows a fruit garden, probably the Tuileries, in grays and blues. The frieze at the top is of white flowers in arches with blue sky between the arches. This room was papered for Mrs. Story, the mother of Judge Story, in 1818.

In the Osgood house in Essex Street there is a most beautiful paper, imported from Antwerp in the early part of the nineteenth century, depicting a hunting scene. The hunt is centered about the hall and the game is run down and slain in the last sheet. A balustrade is at the foot of the picture. The color is brown sepia shades.

One neat little house, in an out-of-the-way corner in Marblehead, has a French paper in gray, white and black, which was brought from France by a Marblehead man who was captured by a French privateer and lived in France many years. When he returned, he brought this with him. It shows scenes in the life of the French[91] soldiers. They are drinking at inns, flirting with pretty girls, but never fighting. Another paper has tropical plants, elephants, natives adorned with little else but feathers and beads. The careful mother will not allow any of the children to go alone into this room for fear they may injure it.

In a Chinese paper, one piece represents a funeral, and the horse with its trappings is being led along without a rider; women and children are gazing at the procession from pagodas.

On the walls of the Johnson house in North Andover is a Marie Antoinette paper, imported from England. I have heard of only this one example of this subject. A number of homes had painted walls, with pictures that imitated the imported landscapes.

At the Art Museum, Boston, one may see many specimens of old paper brought to this country before 1820, and up to 1860. A spirited scene is deer stalking in the Scotch Highlands; the deer is seen in the distance, one sportsman on his knees taking aim, another holding back an excited dog. In another hunting paper, the riders are leaping fences. A pretty Italian paper has peasants dancing and gathering grapes; vines are trained over a pergola, and a border of purple grapes and green leaves surrounds each section of the paper. A curious one is "Little Inns," with signs over the doors, as "Good Ale sold here," or "Traveler's Rest"; all are dancing or drinking, the colors are gay. There are also specimens of fireboards, for which special patterns were made, usually quite ornate and striking.

When a daughter of Sir William Pepperell married Nathaniel Sparhawk, he had a paper specially made, with[92] the fair lady and her happy lover as the principal figures, and a hawk sitting on a spar. This paper is still to be seen in the Sparhawk house at Kittery Point, Maine.

Portsmouth is rich in treasures, but a member of one of the best families there tells me it is very hard to get access to these mansions. Curiosity seekers have committed so many atrocities, in the way of stealing souvenirs, that visitors are looked upon with suspicion.

A house built in 1812 at Sackett's Harbor, New York, has a contemporary paper with scenes which are Chinese in character, but the buildings have tall flag staffs which seem to be East Indian.

Near Hoosic Falls, New York, there used to be a house whose paper showed Captain Cook's adventures. The scenes were in oval medallions, surrounded and connected by foliage. Different events of the Captain's life were pictured, including the cannibals' feast, of which he was the involuntary central figure. This paper has been destroyed, and I have sought in vain for photographs of it. But I have seen some chintz of the same pattern, in the possession of Miss Edith Morgan of Aurora, New York, which was saved from her grandfather's house at Albany when it was burned in 1790. So the paper is undoubtedly of the eighteenth century. Think of a nervous invalid being obliged to gaze, day after day, upon the savages gnawing human joints and gluttonizing over a fat sirloin!

The adventures of Robinson Crusoe were depicted on several houses, and even Mother Goose was immortalized in the same way.

The managers of a "Retreat" for the harmlessly insane were obliged first to veil with lace a figure paper,[93] and finally to remove it from the walls, it was so exciting and annoying to the occupants of the room. This recalls the weird and distressing story by Elia W. Peattie, The Yellow Wall-Paper. Its fantastic designs drove a poor wife to suicide. Ugh! I can see her now, crawling around the room which was her prison.

I advise any one, who is blessed or cursed with a lively imagination, to study a paper closely several times before purchasing, lest some demon with a malignant grin, or a black cat, or some equally exasperating face or design escape notice until too late. I once had a new paper removed because the innocent looking pattern, in time of sleepless anxiety, developed a savage's face with staring eyes, a flat nose, the grossest lips half open, the tongue protruding, and large round ear-rings in ears that looked like horns! This, repeated all round my sick room, was unendurable.

But the old time papers are almost uniformly inspiring or amusing. What I most enjoy are my two papers which used to cover the huge band-boxes of two ancient dames, in which they kept their Leghorn pokes, calashes, and quilted "Pumpkin" hoods. One has a ground of Colonial yellow, on which is a stage-coach drawn by prancing steeds, driver on the top, whip in hand, and two passengers seen at the windows. A tavern with a rude swinging sign is in the background. The cover has a tropical scene—two Arabs with a giraffe. The other band-box has a fire engine and members of the "hose company," or whatever they called themselves, fighting a fire.

Papers with Biblical themes were quite common. In the fascinating biography of Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, I find a detailed account of one. She says:[94]

"When we reached Schenectady, the first city we children had ever seen, we stopped to dine at the old 'Given's Hotel,' where we broke loose from all the moorings of propriety on beholding the paper on the dining-room wall illustrating, in brilliant colors, some of the great events in sacred history. There were the patriarchs with flowing beards and in gorgeous attire; Abraham, offering up Isaac; Joseph, with his coat of many colors, thrown into a pit by his brethren; Noah's Ark on an ocean of waters; Pharaoh and his host in the Red Sea; Rebecca at the well; and Moses in the bulrushes.

"All these distinguished personages were familiar to us, and to see them here for the first time in living colors made silence and eating impossible. We dashed around the room, calling to each other: 'O, Kate, look here!' 'O, Madge, look there!' 'See little Moses!' 'See the angels on Jacob's ladder!'

"Our exclamations could not be kept within bounds. The guests were amused beyond description, while my mother and elder sisters were equally mortified; but Mr. Bayard, who appreciated our childish surprise and delight, smiled and said: 'I'll take them around and show them the pictures, and then they will be able to dine,' which we finally did."

Inns often indulge in striking papers. A famous series of hunting scenes, called "The Eldorado," is now seen in several large hotels; it has recently been put on in the Parker House, Boston. It was the joint work of two Alsatian artists, Ehrmann and Zipelius, and was printed from about two thousand blocks. The Zuber[95] family in Alsace has manufactured this spirited panel paper for over fifty years; it has proved as profitable as a gold mine and is constantly called for; I was shown a photograph of the descendants of the owner and a large crowd of workmen gathered to celebrate the hundredth anniversary of the firm, which was established in 1797.

An old inn at Groton, Massachusetts, was mentioned as having curious papers, but they proved to be modern. The walls, I hear, were originally painted with landscapes. This was an earlier style than scenic papers—akin to frescoing. A friend writes me:

"The odd papers now on the walls of Groton Inn have the appearance of being ancient, although the oldest is but thirty years old. Two of them are not even reproductions, as the one in the hall depicts the Paris Exposition of 1876, and that in the office gives scenes from the life of Buffalo Bill.

"The Exposition has the principal buildings in the background, with a fountain, and a long flight of steps in front leading to a street that curves round until it meets the same scene again. Persons of many nations, in characteristic dress, promenade the street. Pagodas and other unique buildings are dotted here and there. The entire scene is surrounded with a kind of frame of grasses and leaves, in somewhat of a Louis Quinze shape. Each one of these scenes has 'Paris Exposition, 1876,' printed on it, like a quack advertisement on a rock.

"The Wild West scenes include the log cabin, the stage coach held up, the wild riding, and the throwing of the lasso.

"The paper on the dining-room may be a reproduction. It looks like Holland, although there are no[96] windmills. But the canal is there with boats and horses, other horses drinking, and men fishing; also a Dutchy house with a bench outside the door. This paper looks as if it had been put on the walls a hundred years ago, but in reality it is the most recent of the three. The date of the beginning of the Inn itself is lost in the dim past, but we know it is more than two hundred years old. Tradition has it that there were originally but two rooms which were occupied by the minister."

When some one writes on our early inns, as has been done so charmingly for those of England, I prophecy that the queer papers of the long ago will receive enthusiastic attention.

Towns near a port, or an island like Nantucket, are sure to have fine old papers to show. A Nantucket woman, visiting the Art Museum in Boston some dozen years since, noticed an old paper there which was highly valued. Remembering that she had a roll of the very same style in her attic, she went home delighted, and proudly exhibited her specimen, which was, I believe, the motive power which started the Nantucket Historical Society. I was presented with a piece of the paper—a hand-painted design with two alternating pictures; an imposing castle embowered in greenery, its towers and spires stretching far into the sky, and below, an ornate bridge, with a score of steps at the left, and below that the pale blue water. Engrossed lovers and flirtatious couples are not absent.

"A Peep at the Moon" comes from Nantucket. It reveals fully as much as our life-long students of that dead planet have been able to show us, and the inhabitants are as probable as any described as existing on Mars.[97] At Duxbury, Massachusetts, there are still two much-talked-of papers, in what is called the "Weston House"—now occupied by the Powder Point School. Mrs. Ezra Weston was a Bradford, and the story is that this paper was brought from Paris by her brother, Captain Gershom Bradford. There is a continuous scene around the room, apparently from the environs of Paris. Upstairs, a small room is papered with the remains of the "Pizarro" paper, which was formerly in the sitting-room opposite the parlor. This has tropical settings and shows the same characters in more or less distinct scenes about the wall. The paper was so strong that it was taken off the sitting-room in complete strips and is now on a small upper chamber.

A stranger, who had heard of my collection, sent a beautiful photograph with this glowing description:

"This wall-paper looks Oriental; it is gilt. Arabs are leading camels, while horses are prancing proudly with their masters in the saddle as the crescent moon is fast sinking to rest in a cloudless sky. Fountains are playing outside of the portal entrance to a building of Saracenic architecture, a quiet, restful scene, decidedly rich and impressive."

Thomas Bailey Aldrich, in his Story of a Bad Boy, describes his grandfather's old home—the Nutter House at Rivermouth, he calls it, but he doubtless has in mind some house at Portsmouth, his birthplace.

"On each side of the hall are doors (whose knobs, it must be confessed, do not turn very easily), opening into large rooms wainscoted and rich in wood-carvings about the mantel-pieces and cornices. The walls are covered with pictured paper, representing landscapes and[98] sea-views. In the parlor, for example, this enlivening group is repeated all over the room:—A group of English peasants, wearing Italian hats, are dancing on a lawn that abruptly resolves itself into a sea-beach, upon which stands a flabby fisherman (nationality unknown), quietly hauling in what appears to be a small whale, and totally regardless of the dreadful naval combat going on just beyond the end of his fishing-rod. On the other side of the ships is the main-land again, with the same peasants dancing. Our ancestors were very worthy people, but their wall-papers were abominable."

With the paper on the little hall chamber which was the Bad Boy's own, he was quite satisfied, as any healthy-minded boy should have been:

"I had never had a chamber all to myself before, and this one, about twice the size of our state-room on board the Typhoon, was a marvel of neatness and comfort. Pretty chintz curtains hung at the window, and a patch quilt of more colors than were in Joseph's coat covered the little truckle-bed. The pattern of the wall-paper left nothing to be desired in that line. On a gray background were small bunches of leaves, unlike any that ever grew in this world; and on every other bunch perched a yellow-bird, pitted with crimson spots, as if it had just recovered from a severe attack of the small-pox. That no such bird ever existed did not detract from my admiration of each one. There were two hundred and sixty-eight of these birds in all, not counting those split in two where the paper was badly joined. I counted them once when I was laid up with a fine black eye, and falling asleep immediately dreamed that the whole flock suddenly took wing and flew out of the[99] window. From that time I was never able to regard them as merely inanimate objects."

One of the most spirited papers I have seen is a series of horse-racing scenes which once adorned the walls of the eccentric Timothy Dexter. Fragments of this paper are still preserved, framed, by Mr. T. E. Proctor of Topsfield, Mass. The drawing makes up in spirit what it lacks in accuracy, and the coloring leaves nothing to the imagination. The grass and sky are as green and blue as grass and sky can be, and the jockeys' colors could be distinguished from the most distant grand-stand.

This paper is a memento of the remarkable house of a remarkable man—Timothy Dexter, an eighteenth century leather merchant of Massachusetts, whose earnings, invested through advice conveyed to him in dreams, brought him a fortune. With this he was able to gratify his unique tastes in material luxuries. His house at Newburyport was filled with preposterous French furniture and second-rate paintings. On the roof were minarets decorated with a profusion of gold balls. In front of the house he placed rows of columns, some fifteen feet in height, surmounted by heroic wooden figures of famous men. As his taste in great men changed he would have the attire and features of some statue modified, so that General Morgan might one day find himself posing as Bonaparte. On a Roman circle before the entrance stood his permanent hero, Washington, supported on the left by Jefferson, on the right by Adams, who was obliged to stand uncovered in all weathers, to suit Timothy's ideas of the respect due to General Washington. Four roaring wooden lions guarded this[100] Pantheon, and the figures were still standing when the great gale of 1815 visited Newburyport. Then the majority fell. The rest were sold for a song, and were scattered, serving as weather vanes and tavern signs.

Timothy Dexter wrote one book, which is now deservedly rare. This was A Pickle for the Knowing Ones, of which he published at least two editions. In this book he spoke his mind on all subjects; his biographer, Samuel L. Knapp, calls it "a Galamathus of all the saws, shreds, and patches that ever entered the head of a motley fool, with items of his own history and family difficulties." His vanity, literary style and orthography may be seen in his assertion: "Ime the first Lord in the Younited States of Amercary, now of Newburyport. It is the voice of the peopel and I cant Help it." To the second edition of his Pickle he appended this paragraph: "Mister Printer the knowing ones complane of my book the first edition had no stops I put in A Nuf here and they may peper and solt it as they plese." A collection of quotation marks, or "stops" followed.

"Lord Dexter," as he called himself and was called by one Jonathan Plummer, a parasitic versifier who chanted doggerel in his praise, was a picturesque character enough, and we are glad to have his memory kept green by these few remaining bits of paper from his walls.

[103]

IT was in 1880 that Clarence Cook said: "One can hardly estimate the courage it would take to own that one liked an old-fashioned paper." How strange that sounds now, in 1905, when all the best manufacturers and sellers of wall-papers are reproducing the very old designs, for which they find a ready sale among the most fastidious searchers for the beautiful. One noted importer writes me:

"Yes, old time wall-papers are being revived, and no concern is taking more interest in the matter than ourselves. Many old designs, which had not been printed for thirty or forty years, have been taken up by us and done in colors to suit the taste of the period, and we find that few of the new drawings excel or even approach the old ones in interest.

"The glazed chintzes of the present day are all done over old blocks which had remained unused for half a century, and those very interesting fabrics are in the original colorings, it having been found that any new schemes of color do not seem to work so well."[104]

Sending recently to a leading Boston paper store for samples for my dining-room, and expressing no desire for old patterns, I received a reproduction of the paper on the hall of the old Longfellow house at Portland, Maine, and a design of small medallions of the real antique kind,—a shepherdess with her sheep and, at a little distance, a stiff looking cottage, presumably her abode, set on a shiny white ground marked with tiny tiles.

In fact, there is a general revival of these old designs, the original blocks often being used for re-printing. Go to any large store in any city to-day, where wall-papers are sold, and chintzes and cretonnes for the finest effects in upholstery. You will be shown, first, old-fashioned landscape papers; botanically impossible, but cheerful baskets of fruits and flowers; or panels, with a pretty rococo effect of fairy-like garlands of roses swung back and forth across the openwork of the frame at each side, and suspended in garlands at top and bottom after French modes of the Louis XIV., XV. or XVI. periods. They are even reproducing the hand woven tapestries of Gobelin of Paris, during the latter part of the reign of Louis XIV., when French art was at its height.

In London Tit-Bits, I recently found something apropos: "'Here,' said a wall-paper manufacturer, 'are examples of what we call tapestry papers. They are copied exactly from the finest Smyrna and Turkish rugs, the colors and designs being reproduced with startling fidelity. We have men ransacking all Europe, copying paintings and mural decorations of past centuries. Here is the pattern of a very beautiful design of the time of Louis XVI., which we obtained in rather a curious[105] way. One of our customers happened to be in Paris last summer, and being fond of inspecting old mansions, he one day entered a tumble-down chateau, which once belonged to a now dead and long forgotten Marquise. The rooms were absolutely in a decaying condition, but in the salon the wall-paper still hung, though in ribbons. The pattern was so exquisite in design, and the coloring, vivid still in many places, so harmonious, that he collected as many portions as he could and sent them to us to reproduce as perfectly as possible.

"We succeeded beyond his best hopes, and the actual paper is now hanging on the walls of a West End mansion. We only manufactured sufficient to cover the ball-room, and it cost him two pounds a yard, but he never grumbled, and it was not dear, considering the difficulty we had."

An article in the Artist of London, September, 1898, by Lindsay P. Butterfield, describes a wonderful find of old paper and its restoration:

"Painted decoration, whether by hand or stencil, was, no doubt, the immediate forerunner of paper hangings. The earliest reference to paper hangings in this country is to be found in the inventory taken at 'the monasterye of S. Syxborough in the Ile of Shepey, in the Countie of Kent, by Syr Thomas Cheney, Syr William Hawle, Knyghts and Antony Slewtheger, Esquyer, the XXVII day of Marche, in XXVII the yeare of our Soveraigne Lorde, Kyng Henrye the VIII, of the goods and catall belongyng to sayde Monastery.'

"In this very interesting document, a minutely descriptive list of the ornaments, furniture and fittings of the nuns' chambers is given. We find from this that, in place of the 'paynted clothes for the hangings[106] of the chamber,' mentioned in most of the entries, under the heading of Dame Margaret Somebody's chamber is set down 'the chamber hangings of painted papers.'

"Wall-papers of Charles II.'s reign, and later, are still in existence; those at Ightham Mote, Kent, are well known instances.

"But so far as the writer is aware, the accompanying reproductions represent the oldest wall-papers now existing in England. They were found during the restoration of a fifteenth century timber-built house, known as 'Borden Hall' or the 'Parsonage Farm,' in the village of Borden, near Sittingbourne, Kent.

"The design marked 'A' was discovered in small fragments when the Georgian battening and wainscoats were removed in the first floor bed-room of the east front, in the oldest part of the house. These fragments showed that the tough paper had been originally nailed with flat-headed nails to the dried clay 'daubing' or plaster, with which the spaces between the timber uprights of the walls were filled in; the timbers themselves were painted a dark blue-grey, and a border of the same framed the strips of wall-paper. Owing to the walls having been battened out nearly two centuries ago, these fragments of a really striking design have been preserved to us.

"The design of 'B' was also found on the first floor, in the rear portion of the house. It had been pasted, in the modern manner, onto a large plaster surface. The walls on which it was found had been re-plastered over the original plastering and paper and thus the latter was preserved in perfect condition. The design and quality of the paper, and the mode of its attachment, point to[107] a date of about 1650. 'A' is probably of an earlier date (say 1550-1600) and is very thick and tough. The ornament is painted in black on a rich vermilion ground, and the flower forms are picked out in a bright turquoise blue. 'B' is much more modern looking, both in texture and design, and in both is very inferior to 'A.'

"Its coloring is meagre compared with the other, the ornament being printed in black on white paper, and the flower forms roughly dabbed with vermilion. The character of the design in both cases seems referable to Indian influence; possibly they were the work of an Indian artist, and were cut as blocks for cotton printing, an impression being taken off on paper and hung on the walls. The house is in course of restoration under the superintendence of Mr. Philip M. Johnston, architect, to whom I am indebted for some of the particulars above given. To the owner of Borden Hall, Lewis Levy, Esq., I am also indebted for permission to publish the designs which I have reproduced in fac-simile from the original fragments. It is hoped shortly to hang the walls in the old manner with the reproduced papers."

I have copied from an 1859 edition of Rambles about Portsmouth, a strange story of the restoration of frescoes in the old Warner house at Portsmouth, New Hampshire:

"At the head of the stairs, on the broad space each side of the hall windows, there are pictures of two Indians, life size, highly decorated and executed by a skillful artist. These pictures have always been on view there, and are supposed to represent some Indian with whom the original owner traded in furs, in which business he was engaged. In the lower hall of the house are[108] still displayed the enormous antlers of an elk, a gift from these red men.

"Not long since, the spacious front entry underwent repairs; there had accumulated four coatings of paper. In one place, on removing the under coating, the picture of a horse was discovered by a little girl. This led to further investigation; the horse of life size was developed; a little further work exhumed Governor Phipps on his charger. The process of clearing the walls was now entered upon in earnest, as if delving in the ruins of Pompeii.

"The next discovery was that of a lady at a spinning wheel (ladies span in those days!) who seems interrupted in her work by a hawk lighting among the chickens.

"Then came a Scripture scene; Abraham offering up Isaac; the angel, the ram, and so on. There is a distant city scene, and other sketches on the walls, covering perhaps four or five hundred square feet. The walls have been carefully cleaned, and the whole paintings, evidently the work of some clever artist, are now presented in their original beauty.

"No person living had any knowledge of the hidden paintings; they were as novel to an old lady of eighty, who had been familiar with the house from her childhood, as to her grand-daughter who discovered the horse's foot. The rooms are furnished with panelled walls and the old Dutch tiles still decorate the fire-place."

It is gratifying to note that as these old frescoes and wall-papers are ruthlessly destroyed by those unaware of their value (which will constantly increase), there are those who insist on their preservation and reproduction. President Tucker of Dartmouth College, for instance,[109] has forbidden the removal of the Bay of Naples landscape from the walls of what was formerly the library of Professor Sanborn at Hanover, New Hampshire. The house is now used as a dormitory, but that paper is treated with decided reverence.

Reproduction of a fine paper worn, soiled and torn is an expensive matter, but those who realize their beauty order them if the price per roll is six or ten dollars. One of the most delightful papers of the present season is one copied from a French paper originally on the walls of a Salem house and known to have been there for over one hundred years. It is charming in design, with landscapes and flowers, twenty-eight different colors in all, and that means much when it is understood that every color must be printed from a different block when the paper is made.

The paper is brilliant in effect, with many bright colored flowers, pink hollyhocks in a warm rose shade, purple morning glories, some blue blossoms and two different water scenes set deep into the mass of flowers, the scenes themselves of delicate tones and wonderful perspective. The original paper was in pieces twenty inches wide by twenty-eight long, which shows it to be very old. This reproduction will be seen on the walls in houses of Colonial style in Newport this summer.

Yes, summer tourists are looking up old walls to gaze at with admiration. Many have found a Mecca in the Cleasby Place at Waterford, Vermont. Hardly a summer Sunday passes without a wagon load of persons going from Littleton towards the Connecticut River on a pilgrimage to Waterford and the Cleasby House. This house is said to be one of only three in New[110] England which possess a certain wonderful old paper of strange design. The paper, a combination of brown and cream, bears scenes that evidently found their origin in foreign countries, but there are diverse opinions as to the nation whose characteristics are thereon depicted so realistically. An old house at Rockville, Massachusetts, still boasts this same paper, while the third example is on the walls of the Badger homestead, described on page 77. Plates XLVIII to L give scenes from these papers.

The Cleasby house was regarded, in the olden times, as the great mansion in this locality. There was nothing finer than the residence in any of the surrounding towns. The structure was erected by Henry Oakes, an old-time settler in Northern Vermont, whose relatives still reside near by. The paper was put on at the time the house was built and cost one hundred dollars. A paper-hanger came up from Boston to put it on properly, and this cost the owner an extra forty dollar check. In those days, the coming of a paper-hanger from Boston was regarded quite in the light of an event, and a hundred dollars expended for wall-paper stamped a man as a capitalist.

The house is still well preserved and shows no suggestion of being a ruin, although approaching the century mark. The present owner has been offered a large sum for this beautiful old paper, but wisely prefers to hold her treasure.

Paper-hangers to-day are returning, in some cases, to the hand-printing of fine papers, because they insist that there are some advantages in the old method to compensate for the extra work. To go back a bit, the earliest method of coloring paper hangings was[111] by stencilling. A piece of pasteboard, with the pattern cut out on it, was laid on the paper, and water colors were freely applied with a brush to the back of the pasteboard, so that the colors came through the openings and formed the pattern on the paper. This process was repeated several times for the different colors and involved a great expenditure of labor. It was replaced by the method of calico-printing, which is now generally used in the manufacture of wall-paper, that is, by blocks and later by rollers. And why, you naturally ask, this return to the slow and laborious way?

Mr. Rottman, of the London firm of Alexander Rottman & Co., a high authority on this theme, in an able lecture given at his studio in London, explains the reasons in a way so clear that any one can understand. He says:

"In an age where needles are threaded by machinery at the rate of nearly one per second; where embroideries are produced by a machine process which reverses the old method in moving the cloth up to fixed needles; where Sunlight Soap is shaped, cut, boxed, packed into cases, nailed up, labelled, and even sent to the lighters by machinery, so that hand labour is almost entirely superseded; it seems odd and, in fact, quite out of date and uncommercial to print wall-papers entirely by hand process.

"The up-to-date wall-paper machine turns out most wonderful productions. It is able to imitate almost any fabric; tapestries, Gobelins, laces, and even tries to copy artistic stencilling in gradated tints. It manages to deceive the inartistic buyer to a large extent, in fact, there is hardly any fabric that the modern demand for[112] 'sham' does not expect the wall-paper machine to imitate.

"However, in spite of all these so-called achievements, the modest hand-printing table that existed at the time of wigs and snuff-boxes is still surviving more or less in its old-fashioned simple construction. And why is this so?" He then explains why a hand-printed paper is always preferred to a machine paper by the person of taste, whose purse is not too slender. Seven reasons are given for their artistic superiority.

"1. Machine papers can be printed in thin colours only, which means a thin, loose colour effect.

"2. In machine papers the whole of the various colours are printed at one operation, one on the top of another. In hand-printed papers, no colours touch each other until dry, and so each colour remains pure.

"3. Large surfaces, such as big leaves, large flat flowers, broad stripes that have to be printed in one colour, are never successful in machines, wanting solidity of colour. Hand-printed papers run no such risk.

"4. The machine limits the variety of papers to the flat kind; to flat surfaces supplied by the paper mills in reels.

"5. Flaws, irregularities, and so on, when occurring in machine goods, run through many yards, owing to the necessary rapidity of printing, and the difficulty of stopping the machine; whilst every block repeat of pattern in the hand-printed goods is at once visible to the printer, who rectifies any defect before printing another impression, and so controls every yard.

"6. The hand-printed papers, being printed from wood blocks (only dots and thin lines subject to injury[113] being inserted in brass) show more softness in the printing than papers printed from machine rollers that have to be made in brass.

"7. The preparation of getting the machine colours in position, and setting the machine ready for printing, necessitates the turning out of at least a ream, or a half ream (five hundred or two hundred and fifty rolls) at once; whilst the equivalent in hand-printing is fifty to sixty rolls. It often happens that the design of a machine paper is approved of, whilst the colourings it is printed in are unsuited to the scheme. By the hand process, room quantities of even ten to fifteen pieces can be printed specially at from 15 per cent. to 20 per cent. advance in price, while the increase in cost for such a small quantity in machine paper would send up the price to ridiculous proportions."

The use of brass pins in the wood blocks is also a revival of the old method, as you will see from this interesting paragraph from a recent volume—Lewis F. Day's Ornament and Its Application:

"Full and crowded pattern has its uses. The comparatively fussy detail, which demeans a fine material, helps to redeem a mean one.

"Printed wall-paper, for example, or common calico, wants detail to give it a richness which, in itself, it has not. In printed cotton, flat colours look dead and lifeless. The old cotton printers had what they called a 'pruning roller,' a wooden roller (for hand-printing) into which brass pins or wires were driven. The dots printed from this roller relieved the flatness of the printed colours, and gave 'texture' to it. William Morris adopted this idea of dotting in his cretonne and wall-paper design[114] with admirable effect. It became, in his hands, an admirable convention, in place of natural shading. The interest of a pattern is enhanced by the occurrence at intervals of appropriate figures; but with every recurrence of the same figure, human or animal, its charm is lessened until, at last, the obvious iteration becomes, in most cases, exasperating.

"And yet, in the face of old Byzantine, Sicilian, and other early woven patterns with their recurring animals, and of Mr. Crane's consummately ornamental patterns, it cannot be said that repeated animal (and even human) forms do not make satisfactory pattern.

"For an illustration of this, look at the wall-paper design by Crane: 'This is the House that Jack built.' It seems, at first glance, to be a complicated ornamental design; after long searching, you at last see plainly every one of the characters in that jingle that children so love."

William Morris, and his interest in wall-paper hanging, must be spoken of, "For it was Morris who made this a truly valuable branch of domestic ornamentation. If, in some other instances, he was rather the restorer and infuser of fresh life into arts fallen into degeneracy, he was nothing short of a creator in the case of wall-paper design, which, as a serious decorative art, owes its existence to him before anyone else."

In his lecture on The Lesser Arts of Life, he insisted on the importance of paying due regard to the artistic treatment of our wall spaces. "Whatever you have in your rooms, think first of the walls, for they are that which makes your house and home; and, if you don't make some sacrifice in their favor, you will find your chambers have a sort of makeshift, lodging-house look[115] about them, however rich and handsome your movables may be."

A collector is always under a spell; hypnotized, bewitched, possibly absurdly engrossed and unduly partial to his own special hobby, and to uninterested spectators, no doubt seems a trifle unbalanced, whether his specialty be the fossilized skeleton of an antediluvian mammoth or a tiny moth in a South American jungle.

I am not laboring under the exhilarating but erroneous impression that there is any widespread and absorbing interest in this theme. As the distinguished jurist, Mr. Adrian H. Joline, says, "Few there are who cling with affection to the memory of the old fashioned. Most of us prefer to spin with the world down the ringing grooves of change, to borrow the shadow of a phrase which has of itself become old-fashioned." Yet, as Mr. Webster said of Dartmouth, when he was hard pressed: "It is a little college, but there are those who love it."

Besides, everything—Literature, Art and even fashions in dress and decorations,—while seeming to progress really go in waves. We are now wearing the bonnets, gowns and mantles of the 1830 style and much earlier. Fabulous and fancy prices are gladly given for antique furniture; high boys, low boys, hundred-legged tables, massive four-post bedsteads, banjo clocks, and crystal chandeliers.

Those able to do it are setting tapestries into their stately walls, hangings of rich brocades and silk are again in vogue and the old designs for wall-paper are being hunted up all through Europe and this country. Some also adopt a colored wash for their bed-room walls, and[116] cover their halls with burlap or canvas, while the skins of wild animals adorn city dens as well as the mountain lodge or the seaside bungalow. So we have completed the circle.

The unco rich of to-day give fabulous sums for crystal candelabra, or museum specimens of drawing room furniture; and collectors, whether experts or amateurs, and beginners just infected with the microbe are searching for hidden treasures of china, silver and glass.

Why should the Old Time Wall-Papers alone be left unchronicled and forgotten? In them the educated in such matters read the progress of the Art; some of them are more beautiful than many modern paintings; the same patterns are being admired and brought out; the papers themselves will soon all be removed.

Hawthorne believed that the furniture of a room was magnetized by those who occupied it; a modern psychologist declares that even a rag doll dearly loved by a child becomes something more than a purely inanimate object. We should certainly honor the wall-papers brought over the seas from various countries at great expense to beautify the Homes of our Ancestors.

The wall-papers reproduced in the following plates were in many cases faded, water-stained and torn, when photographed. Many of the photographs are amateur work; some are badly focused and composed, some taken in small rooms and under unfavorable conditions of light. The reader will bear this in mind in judging the papers themselves and the present reproductions.

The Bayeux Tapestry.

The Bayeux Tapestry.

King Harold listening to news of the preparations of William of Orange for the invasion of Britain.

Borden Hall Paper.

Borden Hall Paper.

Early English Pictorial Paper

The Cultivation of Tea.

The Cultivation of Tea.

Paper on another side of room shown in Plate XII.

The Cultivation of Tea.

Third side of same room. The scene continues round the room without repetition.

Early American Fresco.

Early American Fresco.

Another side of same room, showing conventionalized water fall and bend in the river.

Early American Fresco.

Another view of the painted walls at Westwood, Mass. The object depicted is neither a whale nor a torpedo-boat, but an island.

Early American Fresco.

Early Stencilled Paper.

Fragments of very old paper from Nantucket, R. I.

A Peep at the Moon.

Another quaint stencilled paper found at Nantucket, R. I.

Pictured Ruins and Decorative Designs.

Hand Colored Paper with Repeated Pattern.

Scenes from Nature in Repeated Design.

The Alhambra.

Cathedral Porch and Shrine in Repeated Design.

Cathedral Porch and Shrine, Architectural Background.

Birds of Paradise and Peacocks.

Sacred to Washington.

Memorial paper in black and gray placed on many walls soon after the death of Washington. The example photographed was on a hall and stairway. (p.88)

Dorothy Quincy Wedding Paper.

The Pantheon.

Canterbury Bells.

The First Railroad Locomotive.

High Street House Paper.

Pizarro in Peru.

Pizarro in Peru.

Another corner of same room. Both the paper and photograph are difficult to reproduce.

Tropical Scenes.

Tropical Scenes.

Ham house paper. Another side of room.

On the Bosporus.

On the Bosporus.

Opposite side of same room. Fishing from caiques on the Golden Horn before Stamboul.

Oriental Scenes.

Oriental Scenes.

Continuation of same paper; apparently a religious procession.

Oriental Scenes.

Another section of the Lathrop house paper.

Oriental Scenes.

End of room containing three preceding scenes.

Early Nineteenth Century Scenic Paper.

Parlor of Mrs. Cowles' house, end of room.

Harbor Scene.

The Spanish Fandango.

Continuation of same paper; another side of room.

Strolling Players.

Rural Scene.

Paper on the parlor of Mr. Josiah Cloye at Ashland, Massachusetts, and found also in several other places; colors neutral.

Rural Scene.

From another example of the same set found at Marblehead, Massachusetts.

French Boulevard Scene.

French Boulevard Scene.

Same as above. Found also in a house at the sea-port town of Nantucket.

Gateway and Fountain.

Scenes from Paris.

Scenes from Paris.

Bay of Naples.

Bay of Naples.

Continuation of same scene. This paper is in neutral colors, and made in small pieces. It was imported about 1820.

Bay of Naples.

Bay of Naples.

Another side of room.

Bay of Naples.

Detail: Galleon at anchor.

Cupid and Psyche.

Cupid and Psyche.

While Cupid lies sleeping in the darkness, Psyche takes her dagger, lights her lamp, and bends over the unconscious god:

The Adventures of Telemachus.

The Adventures of Telemachus.

The Adventures of Telemachus.

Adventures of Telemachus.

Adventures of Telemachus.

Scottish Scenes.

The Olympic Games.

The Olympic Games.

A tribute to Homer.

The Olympic Games.

The shrine of Vesta.

The Olympic Games.

Worshipping Athene in the Court of the Erechtheum.

The Olympic Games.

Oblation to Bacchus.

The Olympic Games.

The Lady of the Lake.

Canto I. The Chase.

The Lady of the Lake.

Canto III. The Gathering.

The Lady of the Lake.

Canto IV. The Prophecy.

This scene fills the fourth side of the room on which The Lady of the Lake is pictured, but does not illustrate any scene in the poem.

The Seasons.

The Seasons.

Another view of Professor Young's library. The colors in this paper are neutral.

The Seasons.

Third view from Professor Young's library.