Between either of these and the brown-stone houses which have been built for Mr. William H. Vanderbilt, after the designs of Messrs. Herter, the decorators, a wide architectural gulf is fixed. We found a leading motive in each of the others; but what leading motive, or, indeed, what subordinate motive, of an architectural kind, can be found here? There is indeed no development of lines or of masses, and no organized relation of parts is aimed at. The openings are not grouped or spaced so as to tell the story of the interior, nor so as to bear any reference to each other, nor are the structural features which every building must possess brought out by modelling; nor is the ornament applied to accentuate the structural features, nor is it designed with reference either to its place or to its function as ornament. The fluted pilasters of the second story seem to be meant, indeed, to re-enforce the angles of the projecting portions of the wall. But this intention is abandoned in the first and in the third stories, in which a belt of carved foliage is run to the angles of the wall, without reference to the lines of the pilasters. This foliage is in workmanship as careful as possible--as careful, indeed, as the carving in either of the architectural works which we have been discussing. Yet its perfection gives no pleasure to the spectator, for the simple reason that it has nothing to do with the building in the walls of which it is cut. Much of the detail is carefully designed, but the absence of a general design makes it ineffective. Except for the refinement of some of this detail, the building would be as vacant of architectural interest as any work of our architectural period of darkness. The Stewart mansion does not interest students of architecture; but the Stewart mansion itself exhibits a nearer approach than these houses to an architectural design, and certainly a coherent design with coarse detail is less depressing, even if it be more irritating, than an entire absence of architectural meaning, with here and there a pretty architectural phrase which in some other context may have meant something. These houses have another misfortune in their very lugubrious color. A vivid piece of painted decoration in the recessed balcony of the nearer is a grateful oasis in the gloomy waste of rubbed sandstone, and some relief to its monotony is also afforded by the gilded railings of the windows at each side of this balcony. But it is to be hoped that courage may be found to let loose a discreet decorator with unlimited goldleaf upon the whole sad fronts. A mode of decoration which has been found so effective in the fogs of London might profitably be employed to animate façades which are in no danger of becoming too joyous. It would not be fair to leave these architectural failures, which are in so unpleasant contrast to the encouraging architectural success achieved in the other Vanderbilt