Evening star., 1925-01-18
ny MARGARET H. DOWNING.


President and Mrs. Coolidge. hav-
ing four years and some five weeks
lease on the White House, are natu-
rally interested in that suggestion
that Congress authorize the accept
ance of gifts of period furniture for
the living quarters. Mrs. Coolidge is
a keen Judge of good colonial fur
niture, and she would welcome a genu-
inc collection of it for the presiden-
tial home, not for her own sake at
the present but for its future enrich
ment. In the upper chambers of the
White House, there are now but two
complete suites of good mahogany
furniture, and both have been placed
in the guest rooms. one is thai
splendid poster and canopied bed of
almost heroic size, with accompany
ing pieces. which the late Mrs. Henry
B. +. Macfarland presented to Mrs.
Theodore Roosevelt. The other, ira
dltIon has il, came into the mansion
in the time of John Tyler as gift
10 his bride, the former Julia Gard
ner, who left it for her successors.
The other bedrooms are furnished with
odds and ends one with an ancient
walnut set in the smallest of the
rooms on the second floor, which was
the cabinet room before the building
of the Offices on the west side OF
the mansion Mrs. Coolidge uses the
llllS Olu lllHipStitN htNl. NM ~ GO N''N
Lincoln bed. but the other objects In
the room do not exactly harmonlze
with this venerable treasure.
Besides admirIng good furniture
and selecting It whenever possible,
the present mistress of the White
House has some notable achieve
ments staged in its storeroom. Last
Summer Mrs. Coolidge unearthed a
fine old desk chair, which turned out
70 have been used for eight years by
Andrew Jackson at his cabinet meet
ings She and her son, John NJ.
Coolidge got out their tools and
1nany delightful hours were given to
repairing it, A colonial desk of the
John Hancock style, and without
doubt an original. has been restored
TO service after passing ingomlnlous
years under the caves. Mrs. Cool
idge during the years when her boys
We're studying the technical arts
dipped into this field also, and finds
nothing is so restorative as few
hours hammeriug and taCklnE ana
granting in the workshop in the at
tic In an era when seemingly every
home is gathering household equip
ment of the colonial and Revolution
ary times il is logical that the most
important home in the country should
not be neglected. If the bars were
lifted by Congress and such gifts
could be accepted by the superln-
tendent of public build lEs, the Nv
ing quarters of. the presidential man
sion would soon possess furnlshlllss
of historic as well as intrinsic Nalue'
This would in a way secure for the
Cbief MAGISTRATE and his family oc-
Cupving the mansion an environ
Oenr worthy of the great nation
which honors him. Except the pam
ings of former Presidents and their
ladies, there are few pictures IN the
White House.
NJ. Emile Daeschner, who viii
succeed NJ Jusserand as Ambassador
from France. has taken over the
lease of the present embassy on
Sixteenth street and until the new
edifce is built on the opposite slde
of this street, near Euclid, the trl-
color will fly over this familiar
dor,irile Nearly all the furnishings
in the French embassy are owned by
the government and the private pos
sessions of the JusSerands VIII go
back to France with them. Ihey
have two homes, one in Paris, when
they have maintained all these years,
and the other that beloved country
seat in the vine country along the
Loire and from which came that
mellow burgundy which, in former
wears. was the favorite gift of NJ and
Nine Jusserand to their American
friends The French embassy has
some fine Sevres vases and tapestries,
which the government has sent from
time to time, and its carpets and
rugs are the envy of all Washington.
But it is unlikely that the Capital
will see the auctioning of these
treasures, as is the case invariably
when an envoy, long resident here,
is sent away. The new Ambassador
is of AIsatian origin and he must
therefore be deemed among the most
conservative Of FrenChmeh and de.
voted to his household possessions.
roomy is the mansion hich
he has taken over from NJ. Jusserand
that he can retain all the state
possessions in the drawing rooms and
chancelry and still have abundant
space for the furniture from his own
home.
That young Mrs. Elihu Root has
become so powerful social and po-
litical leader in New York City
arouses much interest in Washing
ton, where the senior Mrs. Root was
so long a dominant figure. The
daughter Of DR.. Melancthon Stryker,
president of Hamilton College, at
Clinton, her romance was of the
campus, and the marriage continued
Tue u aui LUIS "IIACLL Dl4iu INC iNoOI
family so firmly to Hamilton. Young
Mrs. Root is a very lovely person
and always splendidly dressed, and
with a taste for originality in gowns
which makes her an outstanding fig
ure at such events as the farewell
dinner TO the Jusserands at the Wal
dorf-Astoria and the reception to the
Grande Duchess Cyril. The senior
Mrs. Root has long since handed the
social sCepter to the younger mem
bers of her family, and she is devot-
ing the leisure which she has found
with the passing years to those lit
erary and scientific subjects which
always held her interest more close
ly than social frivols, Mrs Root is
the daughter of that eminent scholar,
DR. Samuel Howe Wales, the founder
and long time publisher of the Sci
entific American, and she had been
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