ers into that fresh and
picturesque apartment through the stained-glass windows.

From the hall the left wing is reached, where the reception-rooms are,
and one's eyes are dazzled by the brightness which reigns there. It is
like coming out from a cathedral into broad daylight. The furniture, of
gilt wood and Genoese velvet, looks very bright. The walls are white
and gold; and flowers are everywhere. At the end is Madame Desvarennes's
bedroom, because she does not like mounting stairs, and lives on
the ground floor. Adjoining it is a conservatory, furnished as a
drawing-room, and serving as a boudoir for the mistress of the house.

The dining-room, the gun-room, and the smoking-room are in the right
wing. The gun-room deserves a particular description. Four glass cases
contain guns of every description and size of the best English and
French manufacture. All the furniture is made of stags' horns, covered
with fox-skins and wolf-skins. A large rug, formed by four bears' skins,
with menacing snouts, showing their white teeth at the four corners,
is in the centre of the room. On the walls are four paintings by
Princeteau, admirably executed, and representing hunting scenes. Low
couches, wide as beds, covered with gray cloth, invite the sportsmen to
rest. Large dressing-rooms, fitted up with hot and cold water, invite
them to refresh themselves with a bath. Everything has been done to suit
the most fastidious taste. The kitchens are underground.

On the first story are the principal rooms. Twelve bedrooms, with
dressing-rooms, upholstered in chintz of charming design. From these,
a splendid view of the park and country beyond may be obtained. In the
foreground is a piece of water, bathing, with its rapid current, the
grassy banks which border the wood, while the low-lying branches of
the trees dip into the flood, on which swans, dazzlingly white, swim in
stately fashion. Beneath an old willow, whose drooping boughs form
quite a vault of pale verdure, a squadron of multicolored boats remain
fastened to the balustrade of a landing stage. Through an opening in
the trees you see in the distance fields of yellow corn, and in the near
background, behind a row of poplars, ever moving like a flash of silver
lightning, the Oise flows on between its low banks.

This sumptuous dwelling, on the evening of the 14th of July, was in
its greatest splendor. The trees of the park were lit up by brilliant
Venetian lanterns; little boats gli