The Kendrick gazette. [volume] (Kendrick, Idaho) 1892-1968, 1909-07-23
LoNDoN's TREASURE HOUSES.
Many Private Mansions Could Rank

Many Private Mansions Could Rank
as Museums Elsewhere.
The men who built the great man
sions of London which endure to this
day prepared them for the reception
year after year of the most beautiful
objects, so that now hardly anything
remains to add to them. There are q
hundred great houses in London of
which the least important could be-
taken to any other great town and
proclaimed wonderful museum.
Dorchester House, the present home
of the American ambassador; Bridge
water House; Chesterfield House,
built by the great author of polite
letter writing; Apsley House, the
home of the Duke of Wellington;
Devonshire House; Grosvenor House.
the custodian of a vast treasure in pic
lures, manuscripts and sculptures
Lansdown House, with Its great GAL
lery OF busts and statues: Stafford
House, whose great staircase alone L.
worth a kings ransom; Wimborne
House-these are only a few of the
number. There are many other houses
of minor Importance which would be,
starred in the first line If they were
anywhere else.
There, for instance. in Airing street,
a small narrow thoroughfare close be-
hind the Ritz Hotel, where Wimbornep
House casts its great shadow, are a.
dozen mansions which contain treas
ures almost beyond belief. The Mar
Quis of Salisbury lives there in a mag
nificent palace-magnifcent as to in
terror. Insignificant as to exterior.
Sir Alexander Henderson, q great.
railway magnate, hides the nobility Of
his possessions behind modest street
frontage. At No. II, house built 100
years ago by Lord Carteret and now
owned by Lord Marlborough, lives H.
Gordon Selfridge late of Chicago. It
Is simple-looking London residence.
but the vast interior, spreading out an
you progress, Is perfect storehouss
OF beautiful objects Of antiquity.
Here are the most wonderful Van
Dycks, Greuzes. Rembrandts, Reyu-
oloses' Lelys and Gainsboroughs; GAL
lery after gallery, room after room
nlled with them; books of great rari-
~, bindings that would make the Gu
rators OF most museums giddy with
delight and furniture that one only
nnds usually surrounded by chains to
Keep OF the curious public; and this
10 only one Of the dozens upon dozens
OF old London houses.
As matter of fact, this does not
apply to London alone. All over the
country. north, east. west and south.
tnere are strewn country houses dat
Ing back to other centuries where
great treasures are stored and zeal.
ousy guarded. There is no other coun-
Try In the world which contains 30
many.
Inc french chateaux suffered too
much during the troublesome times of
the revolution. They were burned and
sacked and hacked about and their
treasures scattered to the four winds.
Germany never had many. The
Italian works Of art were kept mostly
IN cities like Venice, Florence, Verona
and Genoa and in its numerous mon
asteries. But in England, where the
country houses have hardly been dis
turbed since the time of Cromwell. the
work of collecting has gone on unmo-
Tested, generation after generation.
There are still many undiscovered
finds scattered about here and there
in spite of the cry that nothing more
Is to be purchased
If you are In a small Mace II NAV