This renders it desirable to have them fitted up with elegance and splendour, but in a style different from that of other apartments. Instead of being hung with damask, tapestry, etc., they are always finished with stucco, and adorned with statues and paintings, that they may not retain the smell of the victuals."

"Vitruvius with great reason condemns an over-licentiousness in compositions of this kind, and blames the painters of his time for introducing monstrous extravagances. We mean not to vindicate anything that deserves such appellations, but surely in light and gay compositions, designed merely to amuse, it is not altogether necessary to exclude the whimsical and bizarre."

* "Rainciau, apparently derived from rain, an old French word, signifying the branch of a tree. This French term is also used by the artists of this country, to express the winding and twisting of the stalk or stem of the acanthus plant, which flowing round in many graceful turnings spreads its foliage with great beauty and variety, and is often intermixed with human figures, animals and birds, imaginary or real; also with flowers and fruits.

"This gay and fanciful diversity of agreeable objects, well composed and delicately executed in stucco or painting, attains a wonderful power of pleasing."

The Adam brothers now describe what seems to them a correct arrangement of a suite of apartments. These they themselves planned and decorated for the Duke of Northumberland's estate, Sion House, near London. "The hall, both in our homes and in those of France, is a spacious apartment, intended as the room of access where servants attend. It is here, a room of great dimensions, is finished with stucco, as halls always are, and formed with a recess at each end, one square and the other circular, which have a noble effect and increase the variety.

"The ante-rooms on each side are for the attendance of the servants out of livery, and also for that of the tradesmen, etc. These are relieved by the back stairs in the towers. That on the side of the great apartment is square, and is decorated with columns of verd antique marble, which serve to form the room and heighten the scenery. The ante-room, on the side of the private apartment, is formed into an oval, a figure seldom or never used by the ancients, but has been sometimes introduced by the moderns with success, and was here in some respect necessary from the oblong shape of the room.

"Next to the ante-rooms are the public and private eating-rooms; the public one is a room of great extent, finished with stucco and adorned with niches and statues of marble; it is formed into a great circular recess at each end and decorated with screens of columns. The private one has also its recesses and stucco-finishing, and is relieved by a back-stair for the use of the servants.

"Next to the great eating-room lies a splendid withdrawing room, for the ladies, or salle de compagnie, as it is called by the French; this is varied from the other rooms by the form of its ceiling, which is coved and painted in compartments. It gives access into a gallery of great length, though rather too narrow and too low to be in the just proportion we could have wished. It is, however, finished in a style to afford great variety and amusement, and is, for this reason, an admirable room for the reception of company before dinner, or for the ladies to retire to after it: For the withdrawing-room lying between this and the eating-room, prevents the noise of the men from being troublesome; and for this reason we would always recommend the intervention of a room in great apartments to prevent such inconvenience.

"The little closets or cabinets, the circular one for china, and the other square one for miniatures, at each end of the gallery, serve only for an additional ornament. The gallery itself, as well as the private apartments, is relieved by the circular back stairs, and gives access to the ranges of apartments on both sides.

"The great circular saloon is a noble room entering from the hall, and leading into the gallery and great stairs, relieves all the other apartments: this serves also for a room of general rendez-vous, and for public entertainments, with illuminations, dancing and music. The form is new and singular; it is a circle within a circle, the smaller opening into the larger, by eight piercings adorned with columns and terminated with niches and statues, so that the scenery, like the decorations of a theatre, apparently increases the extent, and leaves room for the imagination to play.

"The private apartments are now the only part of the plan remaining undescribed; on one hand is the Duchess's bed-chamber, an ante-chamber for the attendance of her maid; her toilet or dressing-room, her powdering-room, water-closet and outer ante-room, with a back stair leading to the intersols for the maids' bedrooms and wardrobes, etc. On the other hand is a dressing-room for the Duke, a powdering-room, writing-room, with closet and stairs to intersols for His Grace's valet-de-chambre, and wardrobe, etc."

The Adams also made changes at Kenwood in 1774, introducing their plans and decorations into an addition. "The great room with its ante-room was begun by Lord Mansfield's orders in 1767, and was intended both for a library and a room for receiving company. The circular recesses were therefore fitted up for the former purpose, and the square part or body of the room was made suitable to the latter. The whole is reckoned elegant in its proportions and decorations, and the ceiling in particular, which is a segment of a circle, has been greatly admired."

This ceiling is in "imitation of a flat arch, which is extremely beautiful and much more perfect than that which is commonly called the coved ceiling," and Adam thus continues to describe it: "The stucco-work of this ceiling and of the other decorations is finely executed by Mr. Joseph Rose. The paintings are elegantly performed by Mr. Antonio Zucchi, a Venetian painter of great eminence; and the grounds of the panels and friezes are coloured with light tints of pink and green, so as to take off the glare of white, so common in every ceiling till of late. This always appeared to me so cold and unfinished, that I ventured to introduce this variety of grounds, at once to relieve the ornaments, remove the crudeness of the white, and create a harmony between the ceiling and the side walls with their hangings, pictures and other decorations."

The Adams were very fond of this combination of colour. Osterley Park, the seat of the Earl of Jersey and one of the finest specimens of the Adam style extant, had its dining-room similarly painted by Zucchi. It is thus described:

"The dining-room at Osterley Park, owned by the Earl of Jersey, was decorated by Zucchi in the Adam style. The walls of this apartment are in tints of the tenderest green and the very palest pinks, these colours being panelled by delicate scroll-work and artistic designs in the white composition which was known only to the Adam brothers. Three large pictures and several smaller ones, all being scenes and landscapes by Zucchi, are framed in this white scrollwork, while the same curving lines, with grapes and vine leaves, outline the pink and green panels of the ceilings, the design of which corresponds with the design of the neutral-tinted carpet. The tiny scroll patterns of the window mouldings are repeated in the ornamentation of the mahogany doors with their artistic brass locks and are again found in the designs of the buffets and side tables, where the ram's head is introduced, which occurs more than once in both furniture and ornaments. Even the tablecloths were made to correspond in their woven pattern, and some are still in use bearing the date 1779. This careful and minute arrangement of detail is found only in an Adam House."*

W. Thomas was another designer in the Adam style; but of far greater importance was Michael Angelo Per-golesi, who was employed by the Adam brothers, and whose designs are equal to theirs. Pergolesi also employed Zucchi, Cipriani and Angelica Kauffman. His books of designs came out in parts from 1777 onward. One of Pergolesi's rooms "has a low dado rail, plain plaster walls, panelled round with a moulding, a fine mantelpiece and a narrow ornamental compo frieze and plain ceiling." Angelica Kauffman painted ceilings, table-tops, and furniture-panels, which, like Cipriani's productions, represent cherubs, maidens, gods and goddesses, and amorini.

*E. Balch, Glimpses of Old English Homes.