tlemen promenaders on reception days, lined, as it is, on either side with the bloom and fragrance of rare exotics. A large aquarium stands at one end, and a short passage and flights of steps lead down to a greenhouse and grapery filled with flowers and luscious fruit. Three other greenhouses flourish in the gardens west of the mansion.

The White House contains thirty-one rooms. Excepting the family dining-room, every one on the first floor is devoted to state purposes. The basement contains eleven rooms, used as kitchens, pantries and butler's rooms. These are open, spacious, comfortable and cheerful to the sight. On the second floor, the six rooms of the north front are used as chambers by the Presidential family. The south front has seven rooms-the ante-chamber, audience room, cabinet room, private office of the president, and the ladies' parlors. The ladies' or private parlor is furnished with ebony, covered with blue satin, with hangings of blue satin and lace. The daughter of the house has a blue boudoir lined with mirrors-its pale blue carpet strewn with rose-buds. The state bedroom of this floor is a grand apartment, furnished with rose-wood and crimson satin; its walls hang with purple and gold. The bedstead is high, massive, carved and canopied, its damask curtains hanging from a gilded hoop near the ceiling. Before the bed lie cushions for the feet; against the walls stand two stately wardrobes, with full length mirrors lining their doors, while arm-chairs and couches, deeply cushioned, are scattered over the velvet carpet. Its articles of furniture are stained with purple devices-national, historical scenes, and have for their arms the American Eagle. The ceiling is profusely frescoed, and hung with a central chandelier,

WHAT MAY BE SEEN WITHIN.

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while in the winter a coal fire, under the marble mantle, suffuses the sumptuous room with a genial glow. One of the curiosities of the chamber is a cigar-case, inlaid with pearls and mosaics of wood from China, presented to President Grant by Captain Ammon, of the United States Navy.

The Secretaries' room, on this floor, is a large airy apartment, with mahogany furniture, set there in Martin Van Buren's time, with green curtains, twenty-five years old, on the windows. The President's business and receptionroom is a large apartment, looking out on the southern grounds, and carpeted with crimson and white. A large black walnut table, surrounded with chairs, stands in the centre of the room. It is furnished with black walnut desks and sofas. On the mantel stands a clock which tells the time of day and the day of the month, and which is a thermometer and barometer besides. The walls are high, and frescoeil on a yellow ground tint. Tapestry and laco curtains are looped back from the windows, which look down upon the lovely southern grounds, and to the river, gleaming at intervals through the foliage beyond.

The stateliest room on this floor is the library, used in Mrs. John Adams' time as a reception-room, furnished then in crimson. It was almost bookless till Mr. Filmore's administration, when it was fitted up as a library, and many books were added during the administration of President Buchanan. It is now lined with heavy mahogany book-cases, finished with solid oak, covered with maroon. It is sometimes used by the President as an official reception-room, and sometimes as an evening lounging-place for the Presidential family and their guests.

On the north lawn of the President's house, which in

Jefferson's time was a barren, stony, unfenced waste, under the green arcade made by glorious trees, now stands a bronze statue of Jefferson. It was presented to the government by Captain Levy, of the United States' army, who in 1840 owned Monticello.

From the great portico, we look beyond this statue, across Pennsylvania avenue, to an equestrian image of Jackson, rearing frantically and preposterously in the centre of Lafayette square. Lovely Lafayette square, laid out by Downing-perfect in blending tint and outline, flower of music parks! Beyond its trees we catch a glimpse of its encircling historic houses, and of the brown ivy-hanging walls of St. John's venerable church, its tiny and old time tower showing so picturesquely against the evening sky.

The avenue of lofty trees on the west side of the President's house-beneath whose shade, in the dimness of the night, Lincoln used to take his solitary walk, and carry his heavy heart to the War Department—were planted by John Quincy Adams. No swelling tree-crowned knolls, no grassy glades could be more restful to the sight than the southern grounds of the President's house. From its height it looks down upon this rolling park, reaching now to the Potomac, bounded by its gleaming waters, on which so many white sails drift, and doze, and dream in the languid summer weather.

CHAPTER XX.

LADIES OF THE WHITE HOUSE.

A Morning Dream-Wives and Daughters of the Presidents-Memories of Martha Washington-An Average Matron of the 18th Century-Educational Disadvantages-Comparisons-A Well-Regulated Lady-A Useful Wife-Warm Words of Abigail Adams-Advantages of Ilaving a Distinguished Husband-A Modern Lucretia-Washington's Inauguration Suit-An Awkward Position for a Lady-A Primitive Levée-Festivities in Franklin Square !—Decorous Ideas of the Father of His CountryThe Government on Its Travels-Transporting the Household Gods— Keeping Early Hours-Primitive Customs-A Dignified Congé—MuchShaken Hands-Remembrances of a Past Age-An English Manufacturer "Struck with Awe"-Very Questionable Humility-The Room in which Washington Died-Days of Widowhood-A Wife's Congratulations-A True Woman-Domestic Affairs at the White House-An Unfinished Mansion-Interesting Details-A Woman's Influence-A Monument Wanted--Devotion of a Husband-The “Single Life "—Theodocia Burr and Katherine Chase-" Levées" Summarily Abolished-Disappointed Belles-An Extraordinary Reception-Blacked His Own Boots-A Dignified Foreigner Shocked-Governmental Enquiries-Womanly Indignation-The Poet Pardoned-"The Sweetest Creature in Virginia ". A Daughter's Affection.

ITTING in the lovely Blue Room this June morning, the breezes from the Potomac floating through the closed blinds and lace curtains, drifting over the mounds of flowers which, rising high above the great vases, fill all the air with fragrance, I evoke from the past a company of fair and stately women who have dwelt under this roof, or influenced the life and happiness of men who have ruled the nation.

First, Martha Washington. To be sure, she never reigned in the Blue Room; but who can recall the wives of the Presidents and not see the very first, the serenely beautiful old lady whose face is so familiar to us all.

I

In herself, Martha Washington was in no wise a remarkable woman. Personally, she was a fair representative of the average American matron of the eighteenth century. say American, for whatever may be her right to boast of superior educational advantages to-day, in the time of Martha Washington and Abigail Adams, New England ignored utterly the education of her women. They were shut out even from the Boston High-School, because they had flocked to it in such numbers in pursuit of knowledge. While her brother went to Harvard, the girl of Massachusetts, if taught at all, was self-taught. Massachusetts had no right to boast over Virginia in that day. The daughters of the cavalier probably were oftener taught to dance and to play the spinnet than the daughters of the Puritans; but neither could spell, nor many more than barely read. But had Martha Washington enjoyed the highest mental privileges, she would never have been known to the world as an intellectual woman, or as a woman who, by any impulse of her unassisted nature, would ever have risen above the commonplace. She could spin, but she could not spell. She could bask in the warmth of the bountiful home whose heavy cares were all carried by her illustrious husband. She could pack the family coach with delicacies, and go through storm and mud once a year to his camp, when the perils of his country had made him its deliverer; but it is doubtful if any impulse of her soul would ever have roused her to the majestic eloquence of Abigail Adams, who, when she read the English King's