“In building this house, I am impelled by no vain desire to occupy a grand mansion for the gratification of self-love; but my object is to build a desirable, spacious, and comfortable abode for myself and my wife, to serve us during our natural lives, and at our death to endow the building with a sufficient yearly income, so that a certain number of decayed or superannuated actors and actresses of American birth (_all foreigners to be strictly excluded_) may inhabit the mansion and enjoy the grounds thereunto belonging, so long as they live; and at the death of any one of the actors or actresses inhabiting the premises, his or her place to be supplied by another from the theatrical profession, who, from age or infirmity, may be found unable to obtain a livelihood upon the stage. The rules and regulations by which this institution is to be governed will, at some future day, be framed by “EDWIN FORREST.” To this charity he meant to devote his whole property forever. As the estate grew in value an American Dramatic School was to be added to it, lectures delivered, practical training imparted, and native histrionic authors encouraged. It was estimated that in fifty years the rich acres surrounding the Castle would be a part of New York, and that the rise of value would make the bequest at last one of the noblest known in any age. Fonthill Castle was built of gray silicious granite of extraordinary hardness and fine grain, hammer-dressed and pointed with gray cement. The building consists of six octagon towers clumped together, the battlements of some notched with embrasures, the others capped with corniced coping. The highest tower rises about seventy feet from the base, the centre tower, the main tower, the library tower, the drawing- room tower, and the dining-room tower being of proportioned heights. The basement contains the kitchen, cellar, and store-rooms. On the next floor are the parlor, banquet-hall, study, boudoir, and library. The centre tower comprises a hall or rotunda, and above this a picture- gallery lighted from the dome. The upper rooms are divided into chambers for guests and apartments for servants. The staircase tower has a spiral staircase of granite inserted in a solid brick column, rising from the basement to the top of the tower, with landings on each floor leading to the chief apartments. The architectural design was understood to be chiefly the work of Mrs. Forrest, with modifications by him. It combined the Norman and Gothic styles, softened in detail so as to embrace some of the luxuries of modern improvements. For instance, the drawing-room and banqueting-room are lighted with deep, square, bay-windows, while those of the upper chambers and of the boudoir are of the Gothic order. In other portions of the edifice are to be seen the rounded windows of the Norman period, with their solid stone mullions dividing the