"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 papers--"if you will give positive assurance that neither house nor walls shall be injured in the slightest degree." _PLATE III._ In abrupt contrast with the preceding specimen, this old French paper is printed with great care and shows high artistic taste. The eight well-composed groups of figures that form the complete design are after the manner of Watteau; the coloring is rich but quiet. Seventeen shades and colors were imposed on a brown ground, and the black mesh-work added over all. [Illustration] 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."