lack, in this quality, what
you will find at Chatsworth. They all show the sharp-edged strata
of unaffiliated tastes and styles of different ages and artists.
They lack the oneness of a single individuality, of one great
symmetrical conception.

This one-mindedness, this one-man power of conception and execution
gives to the Duke of Devonshire's palace at Chatsworth an interest
and a value that probably do not attach to any other private
establishment in England. In this felicitous characteristic it
stands out in remarkable prominence and in striking contrast with
nearly all the other baronial halls of the country. It is the
parlor pier-glass of the present century. It reflects the two
images in vivid apposition--the brilliant civilization of this last,
unfinished age in which we live and the life of bygone centuries;
that is, if Haddon Hall shows its face in it, or if you have the
features of that antiquity before your eyes when you look into the
Chatsworth mirror. The whole of this magnificent establishment
bears the impress of the nineteenth century, inside and outside.
The architecture, sculpture, carving, paintings, engravings,
furniture, libraries, conservatories, flowers, shrubberies and
rockeries all bear and honor the finger-prints of modern taste and
art. In no casket in England, probably, have so many jewels of this
century's civilization been treasured for posterity as in this
mansion on the little meandering Derwent. If England has no grand
National Gallery like the French Louvre, she has works of art that
would fill fifty Louvres, collected and treasured in these quiet
private halls, embosomed in green parks and plantations, from one
end of the land to the other. And in no other country are the
private treasure-houses of genius so accessible to the public as in
this. They doubtless act as educational centres for refining the
habits of the nation; exerting an influence that reaches and
elevates the homes of the people, cultivating in them new
perceptions of beauty and comfort; diffusing a taste for embowering
even humble cottages in shrubbery; making little flower-fringed
lawns, six feet by eight or less; rockeries and ferneries, and
artificial ruins of castles or abbeys of smaller dimensions still.

In passing through the galleries and gardens of Chatsworth you will
recognise the originals of many works of art which command the
admiration of the world. The most familiar to the American visito