for such only it could be called, in order to preserve a proper
humidity in the apartment. The room was carpeted, and furnished with
convenient, substantial furniture, some of which was brought from the
city, the remainder having been manufactured by the mechanics of
Templeton. There was a sideboard of mahogany, inlaid with ivory, and
bearing enormous handles of glittering brass, and groaning under the
piles of silver plate. Near it stood a set of prodigious tables, made
of the wild cherry, to imitate the imported wood of the sideboard, but
plain and without ornament of any kind. Opposite to these stood a
smaller table, formed from a lighter-colored wood, through the grains
of which the wavy lines of the curled maple of the mountains were
beautifully undulating. Near to this, in a corner, stood a heavy,
old-fashioned, brass-faced clock, incased in a high box, of the dark
hue of the black walnut from the seashore. An enormous settee, or
sofa, covered with light chintz, stretched along the walls for nearly
twenty feet on one side of the hail; and chairs of wood, painted a
light yellow, with black lines that were drawn by no very steady hand,
were ranged opposite, and in the intervals between the other pieces of
furniture. A Fahrenheit's thermometer in a mahogany case, and with a
barometer annexed, was hung against the wall, at some little distance
from the stove, which Benjamin consulted, every half hour, with
prodigious exactitude. Two small glass chandeliers were suspended at
equal distances between the stove and outer doors, one of which opened
at each end of the hall, and gilt lustres were affixed to the frame
work of the numerous side-doors that led from the apartment. Some
little display in architecture had been made in constructing these
frames and casings, which were surmounted with pediments, that bore
each a little pedestal in its centre; on these pedestals were small
busts in blacked plaster-of-Paris. The style of the pedestals as well
as the selection of the busts were all due to the taste of Mr. Jones.