this noticeable during the present generation in the close relation
between the French châteaux and the more pretentious American
residences, as witness the recent productions of the late Mr. Hunt,
which have just been published since his death. We are, to be
sure, looking in all directions for suggestions, and it cannot help
appearing wonderful to a thoughtful observer how many and varied these
suggestions are.

Our wealthy citizens are building châteaux in the style of Francis
I or of somebody else, Venetian or Florentine palaces, Roman
villas, Flemish guild-halls, Elizabethan half-timber houses. All,
if tastefully and skilfully designed and placed, have their special
points of beauty and excellence, and all may in the hands of an
architect of ability be made to harmonize with our modern ways of
living and the surroundings in which they must take a part.

None of these models, however, are more adaptable to our ways than the
country houses of France. This, of course, should not be understood
as meaning that any of these buildings can be transplanted bodily to
American soil and still be satisfactory. Architectural borrowing of
this class is never satisfactory; but no architecture of which we have
any knowledge is independent of precedent, and it only behooves us to
adopt from the experience of others those features or ideas which are
most suited to our needs. The plans and the original uses of the rooms
of these French _manoirs_ may not prove directly adaptable to our
ways of living, but the general massing of the design and the rambling
arrangement of plan, as well as the picturesqueness of it all, are
characteristics which can well be embodied in our country houses. In
their way, no better models can be found than the two _manoirs_ from
Normandy which we illustrate in this number. They have both suffered