Mr. Macmonnies's Bronze Door. In Mr. Macmonnies's design the tympanum is occupied by a composition which he has entitled, Minerva Diffusing the Products of Typographical Art. The Goddess of Learning and Wisdom a fit guardian to preside at the main portal of a great library-is seated in the centre upon a low bench. On either side is a winged genius, the messengers of the goddess, each carrying a load of ponderous folios which she is dispatching as her gift to mankind. To the right is her owl, perched solemnly on the bench on which she is sitting. She wears the conventional helmet and breastplate the latter the Ægis, with its Medusa's Head-of ancient art, but in her wide, full skirt, with its leaf-figure pattern, the artist has adopted a more modern motive. The Latin title of Mr. Macmonnies's subject, Ars Typographica, and various symbolical ornaments are introduced in the background. To the left and right, enclosed in a laurel wreath, are a Pegasus and a stork. The former stands, of course, for the poetic inspiration which gives

TRADITION-TYMPANUM OF BRONZE DOOR-BY OLIN L. WARNER.

value to literature. The stork, commonly symbolizing filial piety, may be taken here, if one chooses, as typifying the faithful care of the inventors of printing and their disciples in multiplying the product of that inspiration. To the left, also, are an hour-glass, an inking-ball, and a printer's stick; and on the other side of the panel, an ancient printing-press.

Each of the small panels in the upper portion of the doors below is in the shape of a tympanum, and is occupied by a conventionally decorative design composed of a wreath with floating ribbons, enclosing a cartouche on which are inscribed the words "Honor to Gutenberg"-the Inventor of Printing. Each of the upright panels contains the figure of a young and beautiful woman, clad in a robe of the same design as that worn by Minerva, and carrying two tall flaming torches. The figure in the left-hand leaf represents The Humanities, the soft contours of her face expressing the gentle and generous liberalities of learning. Her companion stands for Intellect, and the lines of her face are of a bolder and severer character.

Entering by either of these three bronze doors, one passes immediately through a deep arch into the Main Entrance Hall. It is constructed of gleaming white Italian marble, and occupies very nearly the whole of the Entrance Pavilion. By reason of a partial division of the hall into stories and open corridors, and on account of the splendor and variety of the decoration everywhere so liberally applied, the eye is attracted to a number of points of interest at once. The arrangement, however, is really simple and well defined, as may be seen by looking at the plan on page 9. With the exception of a portion of the attic story and of two or three small rooms partitioned off in the southeast and northeast corners of the first floor, the entire pavilion serves as a single lofty and imposing hall. In the centre is a great well, the height of the pavilion-seventy-five feet-enclosed in an arcade of two stories, the arches of the first supported on heavy piers and of the second on paired columns. The centre of the well is left clear; on either side, north and south, is a massive marble staircase, richly ornamented with sculpture. On the east side of the pavilion a broad passageway, treated as a part of the general architectural scheme of the Entrance Hall-though really an arm of the interior cross already referred to connects it with the Main Reading

Room.

serves

The Vestibule.-The arcades surrounding the well, or Staircase Hall, as it would better be called, screen two stories of corridors. The corridor which the visitor has now entered - the West Corridor, on the library floor as the general vestibule of the building, and appropriately, therefore, is more sumptuously decorated than any of the others. The most striking feature is a heavily panelled ceiling, finished in white and gold-perhaps as fine an example of gold ornamentation on a large scale as can be found in the country. It is impressively rich and elegant without in the least overstepping the line of modesty and good taste.

The corridor is bounded by piers of Italian marble ornamented with pilasters. There are five piers on each side, those on the west terminating the deep arches of the doors and windows, and one at either end. It will be noticed that these piers, like all the others on this floor, are wider than they are deep, so that the arches they support are of varying depth- the narrow ones running from north

to south, and the deeper ones from east to west, invariably. This difference of depth, both of the piers and of the arches, is apt to be somewhat bewildering until one perceives the system on which it is based, so that it may be well to add in this connection that the same rule of broad and narrow, and the direction in which each kind runs, holds good, also, of the corridors on the second floor, the only variation being that paired columns, as has already been pointed out, are substituted for piers.

The Stucco Decoration of the Vestibule. - Above the marble arches of the Vestibule the wall with its ornamentation, and the whole of the panelled ceiling, are of stucco. By the use of this material, especially in connection with the gold, the architect has succeeded in obtaining a warmer and softer tone of white than would have been possible in marble.

Above each of the side piers are two white-andgold consoles, or brackets, which support the panelled and gilded beams of the ceiling. In front of every console and almost, but not quite, detached from it-springs a figure of Minerva, left the natural white of the stucco. The figures are about three feet in height, and were executed from two different models, each the work of Mr. Herbert Adams. They are skilfully composed in pairs: the first (the Minerva of War) carrying in one hand a falchion or short, stout sword, and in the other holding aloft the torch of learning; and the second (the Minerva of Peace) bearing a globe and scroll the former significant of the universal scope of knowledge. Although thus differing, the figures are of the same type; both wear the Ægis and the same kind of casque, and both are clad in the same floating classic drapery.

Modelled in relief upon the wall between the two Minervas is a splendid white-and-gold Greek altar, used as an electric light standard. The bowl is lined with a circle of large leaves, from which springs a group of nine lamps, suggesting, when lighted, a cluster of some brilliant kind of fruit. Above the piers at either end of the corridor is another altar, somewhat narrower and of a different design, but used for the same purpose.

BY HERBERT ADAMS.

It should be noted that, for the most part, both in the ceiling and on the walls, the gold has been dulled or softened in tone in order to avoid any unpleasing glare or contrast with the white. This effect, however, is regularly relieved by burnishing the accentuating points in certain of the mouldings.

The Marble Flooring. Before leaving the Vestibule, the visitor may be interested to notice the design of the marble flooring. The body of it is white Italian, with bands and geometric patterns of brown Tennessee, and edgings of yellow mosaic. It will be seen at once that the design is harmonious with the lines of the arcade and the ceiling. These are not slavishly mimicked, but are developed, varied, and extended. Sometimes a circle is used to

draw together two opposite arches; sometimes a square echoes the pattern of the ceiling; lines of beaming-as they may be called in an easy metaphorconnect opposite piers; and finally the boundaries of the corridor are outlined in a broad border enclosing the whole. It has been said that in hardly any other building in the country has so much pains been taken by the architect to make the lines of his floor designs consistent with those of the achitecture and the general decorative scheme. Throughout the Library, wherever marble or mosaic is used for this purpose, the visitor will find this phase of the ornamentation of the building of the highest interest and importance.

The Staircase Hall.-The floor of the Staircase Hall, into which one passes next, is an ex

cellent example of this point. Besides the marble, the pattern contains a number of modelled and incised brass inlays. The one in the centre is a large rayed disc, or conventional sun, on which are noted the four cardinal points of the compass, which coincide with the direction of the main axes of the Library. The disc thus performs the same service for the building -only more picturesquely and vividly-as an arrow-head cross for a chart or plan. From the sun as a centre proceeds a great circular glory-or "scale pattern," as it is technically, and more descriptively, called — of alternate red and yel

THE MAIN VESTIBULE.

low Italian marble, the former from Verona and the latter from Sienna. Other inlays are arranged in a hollow square, enclosing the sun as a centrepiece. Twelve represent the signs of the zodiac; the others are in the form of rosettes, in two patterns. They are embedded in blocks of dark red, richly mottled, French marble, around which are borders of pure white Italian marble. The Commemorative Arch. On the easterly side of the Staircase Hall, on the way to the Reading Room, the regularity of the arcade is interrupted by a portico of equal height, which does duty as a sort of miniature triumphal arch, commemorating the erection of the Library. The spandrels contain two sculptured figures in marble by the late Olin L. Warner, the sculptor of the bronze doors previously described. Along the frieze are

the words LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, inscribed in tall gilt letters. A second inscription, giving the names of those concerned in the erection of the Library, is cut upon the marble tablet which forms part of the parapet above. It is flanked by lictors' axes and eagles, sculptured in marble, and reads as follows:

ERECTED UNDER THE ACTS OF CONGRESS OF

APRIL 15 1886 OCTOBER 2 1888 AND MARCH 2 1889 BY

BRIG. GEN. THOS. LINCOLN CASEY

CHIEF OF ENGINEERS U. S. A.

BERNARD R. GREEN SUPT. AND ENGINEER

JOHN L. SMITHMEYER ARCHITECT

PAUL J. PELZ ARCHITECT

EDWARD PEARCE CASEY ARCHITECT

Mr: Warner's Spandrel Figures.-Mr. Warner's figures in the spandrels of this commemorative arch are life-size, and are entitled The Students. Both figures-one in either span

drel are represented in an easy, but dignified and sculptural attitude, leaning on one arm against the curve of the arch. That to the left is of a young man seeking to acquire from books a knowledge of the experience of the past. That to the right is an old man with flowing beard, absorbed in meditation. He is no longer concerned so much with books as with observation of life and with original reflection and thought. The sculptor has thus naturally indicated the development of a scholar's mind, from youth to old age. As an ornament of the approach to the Reading Room, the appropriateness of the figures is obvious.

Within the arch, the pier on either side is decorated with a bit of relief work, consisting of the seal of the United States flanked by sea-horses, by Mr. Philip Martiny. It is Mr. Martiny's sculpture, also, which ornaments the staircase, the coved ceiling, and the lower spandrels of the Staircase Hall. With the exception of Mr. Warner's figures, just described, and of a series of cartouches and corner eagles which occupy the spandrels of the second-story arcade the work of Mr. Weinert Mr. Martiny has this central hall to him

self, so far as the sculpture is concerned.

Mr. Martiny's Staircase Figures.-The spandrels in the first story are unusually delicate and pretty. The design comprises wreaths of roses and oak and laurel leaves, with oak or palm for a background. It is in the staircases, however, that Mr. Martiny's work is most varied and elaborate. On the piers between which they descend into the hall, he has sculptured a striking female head of the classic type, with a garland below and a kind of foliated arabesque on either side. Upon the newel post which terminates the railing