with care, are ill-kept and
slatternly, strewn with debris, as if everything was left to the
easy-going nature of the servants. The main house is of brick, with
verandas and galleries all round, and a colonnade of thirteen huge
brick and stucco columns, in honor of the thirteen States,--a relic
of post-Revolutionary times, when the house was the resort of
Southern fashion and romance. These columns have stood through one
fire, and perhaps the recent one, which swept away the rest of the
structure. The house is extended in a long wooden edifice, with
galleries and outside stairs, the whole front being nearly seven
hundred feet long. In a rear building is a vast, barrack-like
dining-room, with a noble ball-room above, for dancing is the
important occupation of visitors.

The situation is very pretty, and the establishment has a
picturesqueness of its own. Even the ugly little brick structure
near the bath-house imposes upon one as Wade Hampton's cottage. No
doubt we liked the place better than if it had been smart, and
enjoyed the neglige condition, and the easy terms on which life is
taken there. There was a sense of abundance in the sight of fowls
tiptoeing about the verandas, and to meet a chicken in the parlor was
a sort of guarantee that we should meet him later on in the
dining-room. There was nothing incongruous in the presence of pigs,
turkeys, and chickens on the grounds; they went along with the
good-natured negro-service and the general hospitality; and we had a
mental rest in the thought that all the gates would have been off the
hinges, if there had been any gates. The guests were very well
treated indeed, and were put under no sort of restraint by
discipline. The long colonnade made an admirable promenade and
lounging-place and point of observation. It was interesting to watch
the groups under the locusts, to see the management of the ferry, the
mounting and dismounting of the riding-parties, and to study the
colors on the steep hill opposite, halfway up which was a neat
cottage and flower-garden. The type of people was very pleasantly
Southern. Colonels and politicians stand in groups and tell stories,
which are followed by explosions of laughter; retire occasionally
into the saloon, and come forth reminded of more stories, and all
lift their hats elaborately and suspend the narratives when a lady
goes past. A company of soldiers from Richmond had pitched its tents
near the hotel, and in the evening the b