Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1885-05-22
D5seIins Re9isteE
CRAZY QUILT ARCHITECTURE.


The sIIsfit Skating Rink That Is ResponsI-
Bile for the First Falsehood Ever Uttered
BY Mr.. Nye's Ruby Lips. -
1t may be premature, perhaps, but de-
sire to suggest to any one who may be con-
templating the erection of summer
residence for me, as a slight testimonial Of
his high regard for my sterling worth and
symmetrical escutcheon-s testimonial
more suggestive of earnest admiration aud
warm personal friendship than Of great in.
trinsic value, etc.-that hope he will not
construct il on the modern plan Of mental
hallucination and morbid delirium tremens
peculiar to recent architecture.
Of course, 9 man ought not to look gift
house in q gable end, but if my friends dOn't
know me any better than to build me
summer cottage and throw in odd windows
that nobody else wanted, and then daab it
up with eolors that they have bought at
auction and applied to the house after dark
with q shotgun, think it is time that we had
better understanding.
Such structure does not come within
either OF the three classes Of renaissance.
1t is neither Florentine, Roman nor Yene-
tian. Any man can originate such q style
of architecture if he will drink the right
kind OF whisky long enough, and then de-
scribe bis feelings to an smsnuensis. I'm.
agine the sensation that one Of these mod
ern, sswed-of cottages would create hun
drsd years from now, II it should survive
But that is impossible. The only cheering
feature of the whole matter is that these
creatures of disordered imagination must
soon pass away, and the bright sunlight of
hard horse sense shine in through the shat
tered dormers and gables and gnswed-of
architecture of the average summer resort.
A friend of mine few days ago showed me
his new house with much pride. He asked
me what | thought of it. told him
liked it irst-rate. Then went home and
wePt all night. 1t was my first false
hood.
The house, taken as whole, looked to
me ike skating rink that had started out
70 make money and then suddenly changed
its mind and resolved to become a tsnnery
Then ten feet higher it had had lost all self
respect and blossomed into full-blown
drunk and disorderly surrounded by the
smOkestack Of a foundry, and with the
bright future of thirty days ahead with the
chain gang. That's the way it looked to
me.
The roofs were made Of little odds and
ends Of misGt rafters and distorted shingles
hat somebody had purchased at sheriff
sale, and the rooms aud stairs were giddy
in the extreme. / went in and ram5led
around among the cross-eyed stsircases and
other Nightmares till reason tottered on her
throne. Then | came out and stood on the
architectural wart called the side poarch to
get fresh air. This pOarch was painted a dull
red, and it had wooden rosettes at the cor
uers that it looked ike bran new csrbun-
Gle Oh the nose Of a social wreck. Fur
Their up the demorshzed lumber pile saw
now and then places whore the workman's
mind had wandered and he had nailed
on his clapboard wrong side up and then
painted them with the paris green that he
had intended 10 use on something else.
1t was an oddlooking structure, indeed. Ii
nv friend got all the material for nothing
from people who had fragments of paint
and lumber LETT over after they failed, and
then if the workmen constructed its nights
for mental relaxation and intellectual re-
pose, without charge, of course the scheme
was financial success, but intellectually
the house is a gross violation Of the statutes
in such cases made and provided and
against the peace and dignity OF the State
There is look Of extreme proverty about
the structure which man might struggle
for years to acquire and then fail. No one
could look upon it without feeling heart.
ache for the man who built that house, and
probably struggled on year after year,
building little of it at a time as
he could steal the lumber, getting new
workman each year, building a knob here
and a protubersnce there, putting IN
three cornered window at one point and
yellow tile or wad Of broken glass and
other debris at another, patiently filling in
around the ranch with any old rubbish that
other people had got through with, and
painting it as he went along, taking what
was left in the bottom of the pots after his
neighbors had painted their bObsleds or
their tree bOxes-ltte fayOrs thankfully re-
ceiyed-and then surrounding the whole
pile with potpourri of roof, a grand fare.
we'll incubus Of humps AID ho.lows tor the
rain TO wander through and seek out the
different cells where the luna,lcs live who
inhsbit it.
did tell ny friend Of one thing that |
thought would improve the looks of mis-
house. He asked me eagerly what it could
be. | said it would take man of great
courage to do it for him. lie said he didn't
care for that. He would do it himself If
it only needed one thing be would never rest
till he had it, whatever that might be. Then
| told him that if he had q friend-one he
could trust-who would steal in there some
night when the family were away and scratch
a match on the leg of his breaches or on the
breeches of any other gentleman who hap
peued to be present and hold It where 1t
would ignite the alleged house and then re-
main there to see that the FIRE department
did not NEEDLE with it, he would confer
great favor on one who would cheertuly re-
taEate in kind on call.