Standing by his door Mejenetsky listened to the steps of the warder in the passage, and from time to time when the warder went to the far end, he looked through the open door, but the warder did not go away nor did he fall asleep. Mejenetsky with sharp ears listened to the sound of his steps and waited.

At that moment, in the dormitory where the sick old man lay in the darkness barely lighted by a smoking lamp, amidst the sleepy sounds of breathing, grumbling, snoring, and coughing, there was taking place the greatest thing in the world. The old sectarian was dying, and to his spiritual vision was revealed all that which he had so passionately sought for and desired during the whole of his life. In a blinding light he saw the Lamb in the form of a bright youth, and a great multitude of people from all nations were standing in front of him in white robes, and all were in great joy, and there was no longer any evil in the world. All this had taken place, the old man knew it, in his soul, and in the whole world, and he felt great joy and peace.

Whereas for those who were in the dormitory what took place was this: the old man was loudly gasping, the death-rattle in his throat. His neighbor awoke and roused the others. When the noise ceased, and the old man became quiet and cold, his companions began to knock against the door.

The warder opened the door and went in. In about ten minutes two prisoners brought out the dead body The Fortnightly Review.

and carried it away to the mortuary. The warder followed them, locking the door behind him. The corridor remained empty.

"Lock it, lock it," thought Mejenetsky, following from his door all that was taking place, “you will not prevent me from leaving all this senseless horror."

Mejenetsky no longer felt that inner frenzy which previously tormented him, he was completely absorbed by one thought: how to avoid any hindrance to the accomplishment of his object.

With palpitating heart he went up to the bundle of wood, untied the rope, pulled it out, and looking round at the entrance carried it into his room. There he mounted the stool and slung the rope over the regulator. Having tied both ends, he made a knot, and, by doubling the rope, arranged a noose. The noose was too low. He again tied the rope, gauged the height of his neck, and anxiously listening and looking round at the door he got on the stool, pushed his neck through the noose, adjusted it, and kicking away the stool he hung in the air. . . .

It was not until his morning round that the warder saw Mejenetsky standing with bent knees by the overturned stool. He was taken out of the noose. The Governor hurried up, and, learning that Roman was a doctor, called him to offer assistance to the strangled

man.

All the usual methods of restoration were applied, but Mejenetsky did not revive.

Mejenetsky's body was taken to the mortuary and put on the planks by the side of the body of the old sectarian. Leo Tolstoy.

Probably every one is secretly impressed by the prestige and significance of style, and, in some dim way, is made conscious of the fact that style possesses a meaning and is fraught with an intelligible message. The uniformity and unanimity of great buildings is proof of the existence of such a meaning. Coherence of structure stands for coherence of thought. Where not a detail, or smallest feature, which in any way conflicts with the general character, is admitted, we cannot but be aware of an intelligent principle at work, selecting and rejecting. We observe, also, that this principle is independent of and stronger than individual will, since the more it comes into play the more the initiative of the individual is superseded and his action absorbed. From this absorption of the individual there results that uniformity of the great styles which, we feel, can embody no petty whim or chance current of floating fashion, but a powerful, deep-seated conviction of the age. The typical buildings that stretch back in long array into the past, Doric temple and Roman palace, and early Christian basilica, and Arab mosque, and soaring Gothic minster, seem each to incarnate this spirit of their own time. So different, yet each instinct with definite character, they invite us, like sphinx riddles, to guess their meaning. And we are never tired of guessing. Each generation in turn addresses itself to the task, and ponders over the message which it feels must inhabit forms so harmonious and coherent.

1. "Dictionnaire de l'Ameublement et de la Décoration." Par Henry Havard. Paris: Ancienne Maison Quantin.

2" Le Mariage de Louis XV. d'après des documents nouveaux et une correspondance inédite de Stanislas Leczinski." Par Henry Gauthier-Villars. Paris: Librairie Plon, 1900.

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Such is the attraction of style. But it is not confined to styles of architecture. No sooner, even in comparatively trivial subjects, do we come in touch with that peculiar uniformity and ordered motion which marks the presence of style than we are conscious of the same sense of definite character and meaning. Styles of furniture have this definite character as well as styles of building. Louis Quinze furniture is uniform as Gothic architecture. There is, however, this difference, that the purpose and meaning of style in furniture is slighter and more on the surface than the meaning of style in architecture, and for this very reason is perhaps easier to seize. The meaning of Gothic lies deep in the heart of its age. It is the voice of national conviction, inexhaustible in interest but difficult completely to grasp and formulate. The meaning of such styles in furniture as Louis Quinze and Louis Seize refers to the society of the period, and deals not so much with national conviction as with the manners and life of a class. It is deficient, no doubt, in Gothic's depth of interest, yet, because of its comparative superficiality, should be easier to interpret.

In making the attempt we have at least this advantage, that we are dealing with a subject familiar to every one. French eighteenth-century furniture has been so long a fashion that most people's houses contain specimens. of it. Moreover, besides these scattered examples, we have our great collections; we have the Wallace Collection

3 "La Noblesse en France avant et depuis 1789." Par H. de Barthélemy. Paris: CalmannLévy, 1905.

4 "La Reine Marie Antoinette." Par Pierre de Nolhac. Paris: Calmann-Lévy, 1905.

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giving us the full blaze and glitter of the life of the ancient régime, and the Jones Collection, giving us that exquisite grace and refinement which to the end kept the sight of horrible reality from the vision of poor Marie Antoinette. These are museums, not of the furniture only, but of the painting and whole system of decoration of their period. It is scarcely necessary to point out the great value of such collections these, when it comes to the interpretation of the meaning of a style. It is, as we said, in its unanimity, in its development of the same theme and the same set of ideas in many different ways, that the significance of style is felt. All that we set eyes on, not the furniture only, but the ornaments, and bric-a-brac and pictures on the walls must combine to convey the same impression, if that impression is to be adequately appreciated and rightly understood. It is this unanimity in variety, the consciousness of being surrounded by ideas of the same character, but reproduced in countless different ways, which fills the suites of rooms of Hertford House with the very atmosphere and life of the French eighteenthcentury aristocracy. True, what we have here is no deep and solemn conviction, such as inspires those great manifestations of style in which the spirit of an age is embodied. It is only the spirit of a section of society which pervades these salons; a section, too, confessedly frivolous and pleasure-loving and altogether lacking in seriousness and depth of interest. And yet, the delightful complacency with which the philosophy of this particular class is voiced for us by the glittering harmony through which we move, makes it impossible not to wish to transcribe the message. French furniture has often been praised for its beauty, its preciousness, its fine workmanship; but how seldom do we hear it praised for its historical significance! How seldom do

we value it for what it tells us, not of the manners and tastes only, but of the ideas and limitations and view of life of this dominant section of French society! Let us remember, too, what there is of peculiar and fatal significance about a section of society in whose doom the spirit of opéra-bouffe and tragedy, unparalleled frivolity and unparalleled ferocity, are so horribly mingled and involved. Its airs and graces, its solemn antics and elaborate etiquette, relieved against the inky background of the Revolution, are inspired with a half serious, wholly pathetic interest which, in themselves, they might not possess. Morturi te salutant. This débonnaire philosophy, so lightly echoed by the splendor of these rooms, is the philosophy which was controverted by the guillotine.

How shall we seize it? Let us choose the most obvious characteristic here present and question that; it is sure to be the most significant one. Nor, as to this most obvious characteristic, is there much room for doubt. The richness of material, the elaborate and infinitely painstaking workmanship, suggest at once a consummate luxury and the manners and life of an essentially luxurious class. It is a furniture de luxe, if ever there was one. The gorgeousness and glitter of it, the loaded gilding of the chairs and couches, the inlays of precious woods and metals, the carved ormolu and painted porcelain, the ornaments of gold and silver and enamel, studded with gems, or wrought out of lapis lazuli, or rock crystal or other rare and precious stone, all bear out this character. The more we look, the more this impression is confirmed. Luxury here is dominant, is the master motive. It dominates, for one thing, the labor that serves it. There is never any mistaking for a moment the kind of excellence in workmanship, which springs from the free use of a natural gift, and

which belongs to all expert craftsmanship. It has a flexibility, what musicians call a sense of touch, which stamps it at once. The excellence here displayed is not of that kind. It is a forced excellence; an excellence not exerting itself freely, but constrained, whether it will or no, to celebrate the supremacy of luxury. Rarely, save among Orientals, do we find the toil of the workman lavished in a spirit so patiently servile.

This luxury, then, so universal and so dominant, is the obvious characteristic which we are to question more closely. There is a good deal of luxurious furniture made in all ages, and perhaps at the first glance, it might puzzle us to say what is the difference between this universal, luxurious furniture scattered through the ages, and the luxurious furniture of Hertford House. There is, however, if we consider the matter, this difference: that with luxurious furniture in general the luxury is an attribute dependent on the use of the thing. It is an adornment and decoration of something real, an accessory or afterthought, which, though often carried far, still keeps its decorative purpose and does not thrust itself forward as the aim and object for which the thing was made.

The peculiarity, on the contrary, of the Hertford House luxury is that it is an exposition and analysis of the quality of luxury as a governing motive. Ostentation and show are not here accessory to use and comfort. They are the primary conditions. If we question any bit of this furniture we shall find this divorce from reality admitted, and this purpose of display confessed. The primary use of chairs and sofas is, after all, to sit or lie upon, and in most luxurious furniture this use is fully admitted, and the luxury consists in elaborating and perfecting the use, and, by adding the easiest springs and softest cushions, making the chair or

sofa still more lie-able or sit-able on. But the Hertford House chairs and sofas are made for no such purpose. The adornment lavished on them, far from emphasizing their natural use, has actually annulled that use, so that they are now far less lie-able or sit-able on than any cottage bench or stool of common wood. Sight-seeing is tiring work, but we do not imagine that any visitor, however tired, has ever felt the temptation to sit and rest on one of these stiff and gilded seats.

The reader is familiar, probably, with an architectural theory which asserts that ornament must conform to structural use. This theory, which applies to a good deal besides architecture, seems to be, in the case of French eighteenth-century craftsmanship, reversed. None of it suggests use at all. We have said that the chairs and sofas do not invite us to sit on them. But neither do the inlaid glittering tables with their golden legs offer to supply the ordinary use of tables. How could we venture to hide such splendor under a litter of newspapers and novels? In the same way the escritoires are not made to be written at, and the cabinets are not made for putting things away in. Nothing, in short, that we look at, makes it any longer its object and purpose in life to fulfil those functions for which originally, as a species, it was called into existence. Everything has passed beyond that stage, and, by common consent, has substituted a decorative for a useful purpose. Functional use has retired into the background. Show and display have asserted themselves as the raison d'être and serious business of life. With immense pains and patient care, each article and object, in all these gorgeous suites of apartments, sets out to be primarily an ornament; divests itself of reality, puts away the practical purposes of life and gives itself up to an exclusively decorative treatment.

This is, as it seems to us, the note of the style before us. If, as we stroll from room to room, we take with us the formula "a decorative rather than a useful purpose" and apply it to each object in turn, we shall find that each will bow to the justice of the definition. Style, as we said, marks the presence of a definite meaning or message, and here we have the meaning of these French styles; a meaning scarcely to be questioned by any one who in such a place as Hertford House submits himself to the cumulative influence of his surroundings. Let us, that we may the better realize it, note its moment of origin.

Louis Quatorze furniture,

like Louis Quinze, is luxurious and splendid, with its brocades and tapestries and rich Boulle inlays. But it is splendid in a stately, dignified fashion. It harmonizes well with the ordered long arcades and the great ceremonious suites of salons of the architecture of the period. Moreover, when we come to consider it, it has by no means yet lost touch with the uses and realities of life. A study of the furniture collection in the South Kensington galleries will show that, as regards shape and form, a good deal of the simplicity and massiveness of the old Gothic furniture survives even to the eighteenth century. Through the Renaissance period this massiveness is retained, though the tendency to redundancy of carving is apparent. Down to the latter half of the sixteenth century the sculpture is for the most part out of the solid wood, and the pieces, in material and shape, are simple and strong in construction, though treated pompously. Later we come to inlaid marquetries, but still the substantial forms survive. The decoration, however overdone, does not usurp the place of function and become the ruling purpose. And this is the case even during the gorgeous Louis Quatorze period. M. Havard selects the word "majestic" as descriptive of

the art as well as the life of that period, or at least of the first half of it, and, admitting a trifle of vulgarity in the majesty, it is a well-applied epithet. The fact is Louis Quatorze splendor still cloaks something real. Affairs of state still count for something. The pride and power of the nation are still important considerations. Louis never allows any one to forget that he is a great king. This sense of dignity and stateliness runs all through the splendor of this reign, as it runs all through its life and politics, and makes one constantly aware that it is a splendor compatible with a certain large effectiveness of character and aim.

With the passing of the Grand Monarque, however, this majesty passes too. "Avec le dernier soupir du plus majestueux des rois, la majesté, déjà quelque peu méconnue, achève de s'envoler de la terre." A new spirit that knew nothing of the duties and responsibilities of life takes its place. "En quelques instants tout change; le vieux décor s'effondre et sur ses ruines un monde nouveau, frais, pimpant, gracieux, léger, indiscret et joyeux, s'établit et s'installe." Seriousness in life and art goes out with Louis Quatorze; frivolity comes into life and art with Louis Quinze. The old strength and stateliness give place to an artificial and excessive refinement in workmanship, not of detail only but of form. What was ornament in the older style assumes control, eats form away, until form itself becomes ornament. It is the peculiarity of the studies of curves and scroll work of Louis Quinze furniture, and the slender, attenuated proportions of Louis Seize, that they no longer represent the beautifying and perfecting of the common things of life, which after all is the true function of art as applied to things like furniture, but minister and bear witness to a life cut off from such things. It is impossible to associate these exquisite cre