CHAPTER VIII

PENNSYLVANIA, NEW JERSEY AND DELAWARE GEORGIAN

1720-1805

The Georgian houses of Pennsylvania, West and South Jersey and Delaware hold the attention of the observer and stimulate his imagination with compelling force as do few other architectural remains in the territories embraced within the boundaries of the original Colonies. Architect and painter, antiquarian and historian, poet and fictionary, the student and the dilettante dabbler--all alike come under the potent spell of these stately old dwellings and all alike find something therein to absorb their interest. When the Georgian period began--we may set its beginning approximately for all the Colonies about 1720--the affairs of the provincial governments had long since passed the experimental stage. In Pennsylvania, the Jerseys and Delaware, a consistent policy of peace with neighbours and careful domestic thrift, along with the fertility of the

soil and the habitual industry of the people, had accumulated a substantial volume of public and private wealth. Ripe conditions readily begot the temptation to build more ambitiously and means were not lacking to gratify the inclination to spend. From the beginning of the Georgian period onward, houses were planned and built with an air of amplitude and assured permanence that bespoke a comfortable consciousness of firmly established and easy affluence which justified the builders in planning broadly both for their own day and for future generations. Town houses and country houses equally indicated the wealth and estate of their owners and reflected the lavish and elegant mode of life more truly than any of the other tangible memorials still remaining from those days.

From the middle of the eighteenth century Philadelphia was the largest and most important city in the American Colonies and one naturally expects, therefore, to find country houses more representative and more numerous in the neighbourhood than elsewhere. For that reason the Georgian houses in the vicinity of Philadelphia will furnish the examples used in the latter part of this chapter to illustrate the variations of type characteristic of Pennsylvania, Delaware and the Jerseys, in other words, the section of the country for which Philadelphia was the natural centre of influence.

To some it may, perhaps, seem strange that houses which oftentimes exhibit so much architectural elegance and elaboration of detail should have been built in a community supposedly dominated by the principle of outward simplicity professed by the Society of Friends. As a matter of fact, however, the Quaker influence, though always a powerful factor in every aspect of Philadelphia life, was offset and oftentimes strongly opposed by the vigorous social and political activity of the “World’s People”, that is to say, the members of the Church of England and the adherents of the Roman Catholic, Presbyterian, Dutch Reformed, Lutheran and Baptist Churches, many of whom were the acknowledged leaders of society and managed to impart no small degree of dash and gaiety to the life of their day and generation. It should also be remembered that the Friends were by no means uniform in their interpretation and practice of the social discipline of their organisation. While some of the plain Friends were exceedingly strait in their behaviour and dress and eschewed all manner of frivolity, there were many who found it quite compatible with their consciences to attend brilliant social functions, attired in sumptuous and brave coloured clothes, dance, go to punch drinkings and join heartily in the frequent fox hunts for which the country about Philadelphia has always been famous.

In one particular both Friends and “World’s People” were precisely alike. They all dearly loved good eating and were noted for openhanded hospitality and frequent entertaining. At a later date, when John Adams first came to Philadelphia, he notes in his diary with constant and unabated surprise the “sinful feasts” in which Philadelphians habitually indulged. Indeed, a slight acquaintance with the old diaries is enough to convince one that the men, women and children, too, of eighteenth century Philadelphia often “gormandised to the verge of gluttony.” The following entry in the diary of Ann Warder is so characteristic of what often took place that it is worth quoting at some length. She says:--

“This morning most of the family were busy preparing for a great dinner, two green turtles having been sent to Johnnie--We concluded to dress them both together here and invited the whole family in. We had three tureens of soup, the two shells baked, besides several dishes of stew, with boned turkey, roast ducks, veal and beef. After these were removed the table was filled with two kinds of jellies and various kinds of pudding, pies, and preserves; and then almonds, raisins, nuts, apples and oranges. Twenty-four sat down at the table.” The next entry states that “My husband passed a restless night with gout.”

John Adams, recording his admiration for the town house and furniture of Judge Chew of Cliveden, says of a dinner given by that gentleman:--

“22 Thursday. Dined with Mr. Chew, Chief Justice of the Province, with all the gentlemen from Virginia, Dr. Shippen, Mr. Tilghman, and many others. We were shown into a grand entry and staircase and into an elegant and magnificent chamber until dinner. About 4 O’clock we were called down to dinner. The furniture was all rich. Turtle and every other thing, flummery, jellies, sweetmeats, of 20 sorts, trifles, whipped sillabubs, floating islands, fools, etc., & then a dessert of fruits, raisens, almonds, pears, peaches, wines most excellent & admirable. I drank Madeira at a great rate & found no inconvenience in it.”

Servants in considerable numbers were necessarily maintained in the larger establishments and were made up of slaves, indentured bondsmen or redemptioners, and free servitors who were paid what we should now consider ridiculously small wages for their services.

Balls and routs were by no means infrequent and some of the larger houses boasted sumptuously appointed ball rooms that would do credit to many a large house of present day design. As one example of these we may note the ball room of the Powel house in Third Street which occupied the whole front of the second floor. “In this state apartment, the overmantel was an exquisite piece of the wood carver’s art and represented a hunting scene above which were wrought armorial bearings in high relief. Delicately finished carving was also to be found in other parts of the house.... The doors of the rooms are of solid mahogany while a rich mahogany wainscotting runs all the way up the staircase.... The front of the house is of unusual breadth and, as might be expected, the rooms are of dimensions far beyond the ordinary.”

The courtly mode of life of the “World’s People” was reflected even in their church going array. One diarist of the middle of the eighteenth century, a stranger who had travelled extensively in the Colonies and was therefore competent to judge, writes after attending Christ Church on a Sunday morning, that he saw there a larger number of well dressed people than he had ever seen together before. He continues:--“The Episcopalians showed most grandeur of dress and costumes--next the Presbyterians--the gentlemen of whom freely indulged in powdered and frizzled hair.” “While Philadelphia was the seat of the Republican Court, the grandeur of Christ Church congregation was increased. The arrival of the worshippers in damasks and brocades, velvet breeches and silk stockings, powdered hair and periwigs, was a sight to see. Some came afoot, others drove in chairs or clattered up in cumbrous, awesome coaches, with two or four horses, while Washington’s equipage, drawn by six cream coloured steeds, added the final touch to the imposing spectacle.” All this cavalcade seemed but an echo of the earlier days when Sir William Keith, of Graeme Park, Horsham, one of the early governours of the Province, was wont to drive to the churchyard gates with his coach and four, with outriders in truly regal fashion, liveried footmen on the post board and his arms blazoned on the panels of the doors. Nor was Sir William alone in this gorgeous display, for there were others who came with similar equipage and even today more than one of these lumbering old coaches, with arm-blazoned doors, may be found mouldering away in the coach houses of old country places.

An inventory of Sir William Keith’s effects and chattels from his plantation of Horsham will give some notion of the luxury that prevailed there:--

“...a silver punch bowl, ladle and strainer, 4 salvers, 3 casters, and 33 spoons, 70 large pewter plates, 14 smaller plates, 6 basins, 6 brass pots with covers; chinaware; 13 different sizes of bowls, 6 complete tea sets, 2 dozen chocolate cups, 20 dishes of various sizes, 4 dozen plates, 6 mugs, 1 dozen fine coffee cups ... delft stone and glass ware: 18 jars, 12 venison pots, 6 white stone tea sets, 12 mugs, 6 dozen plates and 12 fine wine decanters ... 24 Holland sheets, 20 common sheets, 50 tablecloths, 12 dozen napkins, 60 bedsteads, 144 chairs, 32 tables, 3 clocks, 15 looking glasses, 10 dozen knives and forks-- ... 4 coach horses, 7 saddle horses, 6 working horses, 2 mares, one colt; 4 oxen, 15 cows, 4 bulls, 6 calves, 31 sheep and 20 hogs. A large glass coach, 2 chaises, 2 waggons, 1 wain.”

Besides all these items there was a great quantity of household gear that would take too much space to catalogue. Other inventories of the time were comparable to the one just given.

It is no wonder that people who were able to live in the manner indicated by such lists of personal effects wished to have houses in keeping with their means and looked with favour upon architectural designs of elegant proportions and details. Unlike many of the fine Georgian houses of New England, which exhibited a comparatively plain and simple exterior, the houses of the same date in Pennsylvania and the Middle Colonies displayed a degree of outside elaboration to correspond with the interior embellishments.

The materials used were ordinarily either brick or stone, the latter in many cases being carefully cut and dressed, sometimes for the front only, sometimes for the walls all the way round. This was quite in accord with the tradition of the locality to which allusion has been previously made. While much of the fine woodwork was executed on the spot, a good deal of it was fetched from England by wealthy merchants for their own use in their ships trading between Philadelphia and English ports. The gardens were usually designed in a manner to comport with the houses they surrounded and it is no unusual thing even now to find well kept box borders and hedges that have been the pride of their owners for generations.

Having noted the conditions that made the Georgian style of architecture particularly acceptable to people of substance in the eighteenth century it now remains to examine in detail the features constituting its distinctive local character. The examples of Georgian domestic architecture to be found in and about Philadelphia offer an unsurpassed field for examination and comparison, and a study of their peculiarities shows an interesting evolution through three distinct forms, all of which, nevertheless, belong to the same generic classification. “Georgian,” of course, in the narrowest sense of the word would indicate the mode in vogue only during the reigns of the Georges, but Georgian architecture is not to be limited by any such cramped or arbitrary bounds. It was the style evolved by logical steps from the prevailing type of preceding reigns and was, in short, an expression of Renaissance Classicism, filtered through a medium of English interpretation and adapted to local needs, on lines first marked out by the seventeenth century architects headed by Inigo Jones and Sir Christopher

Wren. The stateliness and formality of Georgian design satisfied the cravings of prosperous Colonial gentry for the affluent pomp and circumstance with which they chose to surround themselves.

The process of evolution in the several Georgian types of the Philadelphia neighbourhood was slow in its working, perhaps, but unmistakable as a comparison of examples will show. Indeed, a glance at the illustrations accompanying this chapter will discover easily distinguished differences of contour and detail corresponding to the evolutionary stages. Fortunately, history comes to aid us, removing all element of conjecture and giving us, instead, a comfortable certainty of the ground we are treading on. It is, of course, impossible to set any exact and unalterable dates for our three Georgian types; our purpose will be best subserved by giving approximate dates between which certain characteristics may be looked for and certain changes expected to take place. We may, roughly speaking, say that the first type flourished between 1720 and 1740, the second type from 1740 to 1770 and the third type from 1770 to 1805. Several parts of these three type divisions were marked by times of great building activity and others again by times of comparative idleness. From 1720 to 1730 there was a great deal going on. Then again, about 1760, we find a regular epidemic of house construction breaking out. Just before, during and after the Revolutionary War, as one would naturally assume, public stress, peril and uncertainty discouraged the prosecution of new plans, although the builders, even then, were not wholly idle. What has just been said applies particularly to country seats, as we have fuller data concerning them than we have about most of the town houses. What were once country seats have been selected, too, because they are, for the most part, intact, while comparatively few of the town houses remain in their original interior state, being, as they chiefly are, in a part of the city now given over to business or to the housing of the foreign population.

Philadelphia affords especially favourable opportunity for a careful examination and study of the several types of Georgian expression. Indeed, for purposes of comparison, the advantages it offers are unsurpassed, owing to the available wealth of varied material of the best sorts, and that, too, in a state of excellent preservation. At times one is really troubled with an embarrassment of riches in this respect and selection becomes difficult. From the early years of the eighteenth century, Philadelphia advanced rapidly in commercial prosperity. Ship building, textile industry and various sorts of manufactures soon brought a bulk of trade second to none among the seaports of the Colonies. Traffic with the East and West Indies, as well as with Europe, poured gold into the coffers of her merchants and brought affluence and culture at an early stage of her career. The chief wealth of her most considerable citizens was almost invariably derived from profitable shipping ventures. By 1750 Penn’s “greene country towne” had become the greatest and most important city in the country, the metropolis of the American colonies. “No other could boast of so many streets, so many houses, so many people, so much renown. No other city was so rich, so extravagant, so fashionable.” Among the features that impressed visitors from distant lands was the fineness of the houses. Men of such social distinction and substance as were many of Philadelphia’s principal citizens would not be meanly housed, and it is not surprising, therefore, that much of the best domestic Georgian architecture in America is to be found in the city or in its immediate neighbourhood, where town houses or country seats mirrored the estate and consequence of their owners. As one instance--and there were many--of a delightful and favourite suburb, now included in Fairmount Park, but then well beyond the city boundaries, we may cite that portion of the Schuylkill, of charm and loveliness unexcelled, where the river winds among rolling highlands on whose summits spacious homes of comely dignity sheltered some of the most distinguished citizens of the metropolis whose society was gayer, more polished and wealthier than anywhere else this side of the Atlantic. Here, too, the country seats bespoke the urbanity and degree of their occupants, and here, today, they still bear mute witness to an elegance long passed.

Notwithstanding all this architectural wealth and its perfect accessibility, Philadelphia has hitherto received but scant justice at the hands of many architectural writers. In an highly esteemed and well known work, properly regarded as a valuable source of information anent architecture in Colonial and Post-Colonial America, the writer of one portion has greatly erred in his estimate and analysis of Philadelphia’s Georgian remains, probably through insufficient acquaintance with that part of his subject. After referring to Philadelphia as architecturally “the embodiment of Philistinism,” he goes on to speak of the buildings of Colonial days and says of them, “The details generally are hard and crude and often inappropriate.” As a representative example of the eighteenth century country place he instances the Bartram house and writes, “The home of the Colonial botanist, John Bartram, at Philadelphia, built in 1731, has two-storey semi-detached columns with huge Ionic scrolls. The German rococo mouldings in the window frames, too, are out of all scale with the humble dwelling.” Bartram’s house ought not to be regarded as in any way representative of Philadelphia domestic architecture, and, least of all, as representative of Georgian buildings. It is in a class all by itself and represents nothing but John Bartram’s home-made efforts in both plan--if it can be said to have any plan--and execution of detail. Whatever its inconsistencies and defects, there is undeniably the charm of beauty and interest about the place, but it has no architectural affinities. The same writer goes on glibly to assure his readers that “In Pennsylvania there were rarely any verandas, porches or gardens,”--a mischievous and misleading statement.

The verandas and porches may take care of themselves for the nonce, but the gardens need a passing word of vindication. In no place were there more notable gardens than in Philadelphia. Leaving Bartram’s garden out of the horticultural tale--the writer might cavil at it as a kind of nursery--there was “The Woodlands” near by, whose gardens, from the middle of the eighteenth century onward were as extensive and famous as any in the land, and exquisitely planned and maintained. There was the Grange, well known from early Colonial days, whose garden, even in its decay, is wonderful and beautiful.... There was Ury House whose box garden has been the pride of its owners and has delighted their guests for more than a hundred and fifty years and is today maintained in all its pristine trimness. There were the gardens at Grumblethorpe, Netherfield, Cedar Grove, the Highlands, Belmont, Fair Hill, to name only a few, while in the heart of the city the Bingham, Powel, Blackwell, Willing, Morris, and Cadwalader houses, along with many others, all had spacious gardens, well planted and tastefully arranged. A writer who could ignore all this material, could scarcely be expected to do justice to the houses. The examples now to be adduced will set the matter in a fairer light.

It ought to be stated that most of the eighteenth century houses in Philadelphia and its neighbourhood were not designed by professional architects, but were planned by their owners and executed by skillful carpenters and builders. Some architectural knowledge was held to be a part of a gentleman’s education, and such men as Andrew Hamilton and John Kearsley, though amateurs, displayed no contemptible ability. The master carpenters of the city, in 1724, composed a guild large and prosperous enough to be patterned after “The Worshipful Company of Carpenters of London,” and, in 1736, became possessed of a choice collection of architectural works devised to his fellow members by James Portius whom William Penn had induced to come to his new city to “design and execute his Proprietary buildings.” In the Ridgway branch of the Philadelphia Library there is also a collection of seventeenth and eighteenth century books, treating of architecture, carpentry, joinery and various subjects connected with building, an examination of which will show that the artisans of the Georgian period were well supplied with guides devised to make the mysteries of their craft plain to the “meanest understanding.”

The two houses chosen to exemplify the first Georgian type are Graeme Park, Horsham, begun in 1721 and finished the following year by Sir William Keith, sometime Lieutenant-Governour of the Province, and Hope Lodge, in the Whitemarsh Valley, built in 1723. Graeme Park was then in the heart of the wilderness and a special road had to be cut, still called the Governour’s Road, to enable His Excellency to reach the Old York Road whenever he chose to trundle to the city in his great begilt and blazoned coach, drawn by four stout horses and attended with all the panoply of state as befitted a person of his rank.

The house suited the manorial style of life maintained by the baronet. To the rear of the main building were detached wings containing quarters for the servants, the kitchens and the various domestic offices, thus leaving the whole of the hall for the use of its occupants. The small buildings disappeared years ago, and the whole place, long unoccupied, is gradually falling into decay, a plight from which, however, it could be easily rescued. The house is over 60 feet long, 25 feet in depth and three storeys in height. The walls are of rich brown field stone, carefully laid and fitted, and are more than 2 feet thick, while over the doors and windows, whose dimensions are thoroughly characteristic of the date of erection, selected stones are laid in flattened arches.

At the north end of the building is a great hall or parlour, 21 feet square, with walls wainscotted and panelled from floor to ceiling, a height of fourteen feet. The fireplace in the parlour is faced with dark marble, brought from abroad, while in the other rooms Dutch tiles were used for the same purpose. On each floor are three rooms. Stairs and banisters are of heavy white oak, and all the other woodwork, of yellow pine, is of unusual beauty, executed in simple and vigorous design. The woodwork is worthy of special attention, for therein we may see embodied some of the chief characteristics of the first Georgian type. The detail of ornamentation is heavy and bold, though by no means ungraceful. Mouldings and cornices are more pronounced in profile than we find them at a later date and stand out with peculiarly insistent relief, while certain forms quite vanished in subsequent types. The close affinity with the moulding details of the distinctively Queen Anne type is strongly noticeable. One feature worth mentioning is the mantel shelf in the parlour. Such shelves were rarely found till a later date.

Hope Lodge, hard by St. Thomas’s Hill, in the Whitemarsh Valley, was built in 1723, as previously stated. It is a great square brick structure of two storeys in height with a hipped roof. As at Stenton (built in 1728), the bricks are laid in Flemish bond and occasional black headers appear. The doors and windows, like those of Graeme Park, Stenton and other contemporary houses, belonging to the first Georgian type, are higher and narrower in proportion than those of a later date. Over the front windows are wedge-shaped lintels, flush with the wall surface, formed of bricks set vertically in the centre and gradually spreading fanwise toward the sides in diagonals convergent to the base. Some of the windows at the sides and back show the flattened arches, to be seen at Graeme Park and Stenton, over slightly countersunk tympana above the frame tops. Over some of the doors are transoms of six or seven square lights in a single row, while over the tall and very narrow side door, just as at Stenton and as over the two narrow rear doors at Graeme Park, there is a transom of eight square lights in two rows of four each. A cornice at the eaves has a deep sweeping cove of plaster on a lath backing, while the heavy moulding courses are of wood. Viewed from the front, the roof is hipped, but from the side it presents a curious combination of hip and gambrel.

Within, a hall of unusual width, far larger than most rooms nowadays, traverses the full depth of the house and opens into spacious chambers on each side. The chief rooms have round arched doorways and narrow double doors, heavily panelled. All the panelling, in fact, is heavy. The single doors of the first floor are surmounted by handsome pediments. There are deep panelled window seats in the ground floor rooms and the windows have exceptionally broad and heavy muntins. The breadth of the fireplaces, faced with dark Scotch marble, and the massiveness of the wainscotting correspond with the other features. Throughout the house all the woodwork, which is said to have been fetched from England, though handsomely wrought, is heavy and most substantial. Midway back in the hall a flattened arch springs from fluted pilasters with capitals of a peculiar design. The stairway, which is remarkably good, and strongly suggests an old English arrangement, ascends laterally from the rear hall. Back of the house a wide, brick-paved porch connects with another building where were the servants’ quarters and kitchens--an arrangement characteristic of the period.

Of the houses representative of the second Georgian type, Whitby Hall, Kingsessing, West Philadelphia, comes first on the list. The western end of Whitby Hall, the part with which we are here concerned, was added in 1754 by Colonel James Coultas, “merchant, ship owner, farmer, mill owner, fox hunter, vestryman, soldier, judge, High Sheriff of Philadelphia from 1755 to 1758, and enthusiastic promoter of all philanthropic and public enterprises.” The gables of the high pitched roof face north and south and are pierced with oval windows to light the cock loft. The walls, not on one side only, as is often the case where a special nicety of finish was sought, but all the way round, are built of carefully squared and dressed native grey stone. On the south front is a flag paved piazza, surmounted by a graceful spindled balustrade, while around the western and northern sides runs a penthouse. The deeply coved cornice beneath the eaves is carried in a continuous horizontal line as a string course across the gable end or rather the gable _side_ walls.

A remarkable feature about Whitby is the arrangement of the roof. It is the exact reverse of what is ordinarily found. The ridge pole, instead of running parallel to the length of the structure, traverses its breadth, thus making the peak higher, the slope longer, and allowing space for a roomy third floor, all of which the view of the south front clearly shows. This arrangement also avoids the need of dormers. “On the north front is a tower-like projection in which the stairway ascends with broad landings. The low doorway in this tower has always been used on occasions of large gatherings at Whitby, whether grave or gay, because it admits to the wide hall running through the western wing, giving admittance to the large rooms on either side. The doorway and windows in the tower are all surrounded by brick trims, which give both variety and distinction against the grey stone walls--a treatment not often met with near Philadelphia. In the top of the pediment with its dentilled cornice, a bull’s eye light, also surrounded with brick trim, is of particular interest because it was a porthole glass from one of Colonel Coultas’s favourite ships, and was set there because of a cherished sentiment. On peak and corners of the tower pediment three urns add a note of state.

“All the woodwork and sundry embellishments

of the 1754 addition were fetched from England in Colonel Coultas’s ships. The pilasters and cornices in the hall are exceptionally fine. Rosettes are carved in the dog ears of the door trims and the cheeks and soffits of the jambs are set with bevel-flush panels. In the parlour the carving of the overmantel and the panelling are unsurpassed for either execution or design. The central panel above the fireplace is three feet high and nearly six feet wide, and not a joint can be discovered in it. Below it is a band of exquisitely wrought floriated carving in high relief. Although it is possible to find more elaborate woodwork, it is rarely that one meets with a degree of elaboration tempered with such dignified restraint and consummate good taste.”

Another house of the second Georgian type is Mount Pleasant, or Clunie, as it was at first called, in Fairmount Park, built in 1761 by Captain John Macpherson, and in later years the home of Benedict Arnold. Mount Pleasant is a structure of almost baronial aspect, with east and west fronts alike of imposing mien. An high foundation of carefully squared stones is pierced by iron barred basement windows set in stone frames. Above this massive, grisly base, the thick stone walls are coated with yellow-grey roughcast. Heavy quoins of brick at the corners and, at the north and south ends of the building, great quadruple chimneys joined into one at the top by arches, create an air of more than usual solidity. A broad flight of stone steps, their iron balustrades overgrown with a bushy mass of honeysuckle, leads up to a doorway of generous breadth. The pillars at each side of the door and the superimposed pediment, the ornate Palladian window immediately above on the second floor and, above that again, the cornice pediment springing from the eaves, all contribute to set a stamp of courtly distinction upon the pile.

Above the second floor the hipped roof springs, pierced east and west by two graceful dormers and crowned by a well turned balustrade that traverses nearly the whole distance between the chimneys. The fan light over the door has remarkably heavy, fluted mullions and much of the detail throughout the house, though highly wrought, is heavy. The two flanking outbuildings, set 30 or 40 feet distant from the northeast and southeast corners of the house, designed for servants’ quarters and domestic offices, give Mount Pleasant a peculiarly striking appearance. Without them it would be only an unusually handsome Georgian country house, with them it at once takes on the manorial port of one of the old Virginia mansions. The interior woodwork, both upstairs and down, is rich in elaboration of detail, and the door frames, with their heavily moulded pediments, are exceptionally fine.

Cliveden, the third member of the second group, was built in 1761 by Chief Justice Chew. Its solid and heavy masonry is of carefully dressed Germantown stone, and at the peaks of the gables and corners of the roof are great stone urns. Back of the house are two wings, one semi-detached and the other entirely so, used for servants’ quarters and domestic offices. All the features and detail about Cliveden are thoroughly in keeping with the same characteristics as in the other two houses already described.

The windows are broad and fill a great part of the wall space in the façade, and the doorway is an essential feature that has been made the most of by the architect. Both indoors and out the strongly classic feeling has been emphasised in pillar and pediment, pilaster and entablature. Triglyphs, guttæ and every other detail of classic embellishment have been wrought with the nice precision due a worthy subject.

Comparing Whitby, Mount Pleasant and Cliveden with the former houses of the first Georgian type, certain differences at once strike us. The whole aspect is changed by the greater breadth of windows and doors. The houses look wider awake. This change in the size of the windows means, of course, that the rooms within in most cases were lighter and more cheerful than before. Then, too, the Palladian window has appeared. Both Mount Pleasant and Cliveden afford good examples of it, Cliveden’s being placed at the side while at Mount Pleasant it forms an important feature in both the east and west fronts.

At Mount Pleasant and Cliveden we see, too, that the door has become a subject for elaborate treatment, quite in contrast to the extremely simple and unassuming manner of dealing with the same feature in the earlier houses. At Mount Pleasant the severity of the roof line is tempered by a balustrade and the effective management of the chimneys while, at Whitby and Cliveden, urns embellish the peaks and corners. Within we find that acanthus leaves and thistles have begun to grow, the rose has blossomed, other conventional flowers and foliage have budded and egg and dart mouldings have appeared. In other words, carving as a mode of embellishment has attained an established vogue. The moulding profiles have lost some of their trenchant boldness and, though the ornamental detail, both indoors and out, is still vigorous, and at times massive, there is generally visible an air of delicacy and refinement not present before.

The Woodlands, the Highlands, and Upsala exemplify for us the third type of Georgian. William Hamilton built the Woodlands about 1770. Anthony Morris finished the Highlands in 1796, and Norton Johnson began Upsala in 1798 and completed it three years later. Across the north front of the Woodlands, at regular intervals, are six Ionic pilasters above whose tops runs an elaborately ornamented entablature with pateræ and flutings, the whole surmounted by a pediment. Before the house is a low and broad paved terrace filling the space between the semi-circular bays that project from the ends of the building. Between the two middle pilasters, a round arched doorway with a fan light opens into the hall. On the south or river front a flight of steps ascends to a lofty white pillared portico from which a door opens directly into the oval shaped ballroom.

In another respect the whole exterior aspect of the Woodlands is different from the houses of the second type. Window treatment is always a most important item in determining architectural character and it is just here that a significant change is to be noted. The size of the opening is, in some cases, the same, in others it is larger but, more noticeable still, the muntins are far smaller and we lose the bold, trenchant barring of white that emphasises the aspect of windows of the earlier buildings.

The interior is finished with all the delicacy that one might expect judging from the evidences of Adam influence without. One highly significant feature of interior treatment in houses of the third type is the change made in the arrangement of the mantels. We have seen that in houses of the first type, such as Graeme Park and in houses of the second type, such as Whitby Hall or Mount Pleasant, the overmantel panelling and embellishment were accorded much care and elaboration. The chimney breast often extended a considerable distance into the room and the ornamental superstructure above the fireplace reached all the way to the ceiling.

Although these ornate overmantels reaching to the ceiling had begun to fall into disfavour in England a little after the middle of the eighteenth century, when houses of the second Georgian type were being erected in the Philadelphia neighbourhood, Colonial conservatism disregarded the newer style and clung to the mode approved by time-honoured precedent. The fireplace with its setting has always held a position of such exalted honour as the centre of family life that the following extract from Clouston’s Treatise on Chippendale is particularly illuminating in this connexion. In speaking of the influence exerted by Sir William Chambers on architecture as well as on furniture, he says:--“When he returned to England in 1755, [from the Continent] he was

accompanied by Wilton and Cipriani, afterwards so well known as an artist and decorator. He also brought Italian sculptors to carve the marble mantelpieces he introduced into English houses.

“These were made from his own designs, and the ornament of figures, scrolls, and foliage was free in character. Strange to say, these mantelpieces, designed and made by an architect, were yet the means of taking away this important part of interior decoration from the hands of the architect altogether and causing it to become quite a separate production, made and sold along with the grates.

“In former times it had been an integrant portion of the room, reaching from floor to ceiling, balanced and made part of the wall by having its main lines carried round in panelling and enriched friezes. It was the keynote of decoration and the master builder of the times grew fanciful and exerted his utmost skill upon its carving and quaint imagery, centralising the whole ornament of the room around the household shrine.

“Mantelpieces had gradually come down in height, though still retaining much of their fine proportions and classic design. Many causes had contributed to this, the chief being the disuse of wood panelling and the preference given to hangings of damask, foreign leather and wall-paper. In the reigns of Queen Anne and the Little Dutchman the custom of panelling was partially kept up but the lining was only white painted deal, after the fashion in Holland. At this time the upper part of the chimney piece was still retained, but only reached about half way up the wall. Gibbs, Kent and Ware kept the superstructure as much as they could, but Sir William Chambers dealt it the most crushing blow it had yet received by copying the later French and Italian styles and giving minute detail more consideration than fine proportion. He discarded the upper part altogether and helped to make ‘continued chimney pieces’ things of the past.”

The much used Adam oval found expression even in the shapes of rooms, and besides the oval ballroom at the Woodlands, we frequently find in houses of the third type rounded or elliptical hallways and chambers.

At the Highlands, in the Whitemarsh Valley, we see the front of the house adorned with tall Ionic pilasters rising from base course to cornice, which is itself elaborately wrought. The woodwork inside is excellent, but unfortunately the Adam mantels with their compo decoration have been removed and now grace another house some miles distant. At Upsala, in Germantown, however, we are in better luck, for there the Adam mantels have remained untouched. The illustrations show the rest of the house and make further specific comment unnecessary, save to remark, regarding the windows, that here, as in other houses of this latest type, larger panes of glass than in the two earlier types are met with in not a few instances.

Before proceeding further in the course of comparison, a word ought to be said about the colour of the paint used for interior woodwork of the Georgian houses of all three types. For some reason there seems to be an impression abroad that white was employed to the exclusion of everything else. There was, it is true, a preponderance of white but its use was by no means universal. A close examination of successive layers of paint on some old woodwork reveals various shades of greys, blues, drabs, brownish yellows and other hues beneath one or more coats of white. Grey seems to have been one of the earliest variants from white and, in some places, nothing else was ever used. At Graeme Park, for instance, the first coat of paint was grey, and no other colour ever adorned its panelling and door and window trims. At Stenton, on the other hand, the taste of the occupants dictated a change of colour from time to time and we find a good deal of variety in the successive coats. During the prevalence of the second Georgian type white seems to have found more general favour. With our last type, delicate colours again began to be used.

Contrasting the Woodlands, the Highlands and Upsala with the houses illustrating the second Georgian type, we find still further evidences of architectural evolution. During the prevalence of the second type individual features were singled out for decorative emphasis, but in the days of the third type the entire front of the house or sometimes the whole exterior was regarded from a decorative point of view. At Cliveden the treatment of the doorway and the urns on the roof are the features relied upon for the embellishment of the façade. At Mount Pleasant the doorways of the east and west fronts, the Palladian windows above them, the balustrade on the roof and the treatment of the chimneys supply a fuller and more ornate decorative effect. But when we reach the third period we see that the architect has considered carefully the decorative element in both the proportions and detail of the whole building. It would be hard to believe that the designer of the Woodlands, in drawing his plans, had not carefully aimed at the pleasing ensemble of the masses. The effect of the rounded ends is agreeable and a marked departure from the straightforward rectangularity of most of the houses of preceding types. The lofty portico of the Woodlands south or river front had no precedent in Philadelphia. Vaux Hill or Fatland, erected about the same time, and Loudoun, a few years later, had the same _motif_, and even John Bartram, in his last addition to his house, adopted the same treatment. Neither was there a precedent for the method of dealing with the north front, so we see that the Woodlands struck two new notes in local architecture.

At the Woodlands and the Highlands we find pilasters carried the full height of the walls--a new feature. The fenestration is arranged with more regard to outward appearance and not solely from a utilitarian point of view. We find that the high panelled overmantels, which constituted an important architectural feature, had given place to the low and elaborately adorned mantel that ought to be regarded rather as a piece of furniture than as an architectural entity. Fireplaces had grown smaller, fan lights above doors had become common and were enriched with beautiful and sometimes intricate metal tracery. The comparison between these later fan lights with their airy grace, and the earlier fan lights of Mount Pleasant, with their ponderous mouldings, is instructive. In the detail of all ornament heaviness has vanished and the polished elegance of Adam influence has taken its place. Everywhere we find pateræ, drops and swags, fluting and quilling, oval fans and dainty urns and vases with delicate leaf and flower treatment.

Regarding the texture of stone walls, we ought also to note that in the second and third types we find neatly squared and dressed stones used to a considerable extent. At Cliveden, the Highlands and Upsala the fronts alone are of cut stone while at Whitby Hall the walls on all sides are treated with the same formal precision.

Briefly summing up, then, it is clear that three distinct types exist. The first has Queen Anne affinities but is Georgian in time and much of its feeling. Ornamental detail is simple and bold and at times a trifle heavy. The profiles of mouldings are strong and in high relief. Simplicity and strength, combined with grace, give the prevailing note in every instance. The second type is lighter and more ornate, but with characteristic conservatism and abhorrence of the new fangled whims of Sir William Chambers and the Brothers Adam, Philadelphia adhered to the modes in vogue in England from twenty to twenty-five years before and kept Ware in countenance who, in 1750, was still crowning his buildings with heavy Queen Anne urns.

Notwithstanding the staunch adherence to conservative architectural principles, however, a new feeling is everywhere perceptible. Though the overmantel decorations still extended all the way to the ceiling, the character of the ornamentation employed was vastly more elaborate and graceful than anything to be found in buildings of the first type. If the profiles of mouldings were not so bold and insistent they were, nevertheless, quite as graceful. With the advent of floriated and foliated _motifs_ in the carving, we naturally find a closer care to detail of all kinds. At the same time there is to be seen a more punctilious heed to all the little niceties and characteristic distinctions between the classic orders.

By the time our third Georgian type appears, Adam influence has become paramount and put to flight all mid-Georgian ponderosity. Even in the case of manifestly “carpenter built” houses of the period, where, quite unlike the three excellent examples here chosen to represent their particular classes, no especial architectural merit is to be looked for, we find no heaviness of line, and the character of ornamentation employed is distinctly either a copy or an echo of Adam _motifs_ and, in not a few cases, has caught much of their spirit.

It must be understood that the houses used for illustration have been chosen because they represent their many contemporaries in the same neighbourhood, all of which display the same characteristics according to the date at which they were built. The foregoing analysis does not pretend to be complete--it would take far more space to trace all the subtleties of the subject--but aims only to direct attention to certain facts that may conduce to our clearer understanding of American Georgian and its resources in supplying our present needs.

In considering the variations between the Georgian types of the Philadelphia neighbourhood it must be borne in mind that they ought not to be judged too straitly by contemporary work in England. Such comparison would only be misleading and unfair for several reasons. In the first place, at the beginning of the Georgian period, local conditions forbade the lavish display of carved ornamentation that marked so many houses of the same date in England. At that time there were few craftsmen in the Colonies capable of executing the elaborate carving in vogue on the other side of the Atlantic. The builders of mansions, therefore, must perforce content themselves by a close adherence to line and proportion and do without the highly wrought carved embellishment. Then, too, besides this difficulty, many of the builders of these early houses belonged to the Society of Friends, most of whom from their religious principles were averse to a wealth of ornament. In the second place, judging by contemporary English standards would be misleading because at the time the second Philadelphia Georgian type began to flourish, and the means and inclination for elaborate ornament were both present, Colonial conservatism had become an important factor in the dictation of style, and however closely Philadelphians might copy the current modes of London in matters of dress, in their manners and architecture they chose to cling to well established precedent and had always remained thenceforward from twenty to thirty years back of their British cousins in the method of their architectural expression. Hence, for instance, the overmantels reaching to the ceiling built as late as 1765. In all its phases, however, Philadelphia Georgian, whatever minor differences there might have been, was true to the traditions of the great English architects, and because of its purity of style is worthy of close study today for the vital inspiration it can supply.