CHAPTER IX
FASHION IN ARCHITECTURE
The milestones of art are the signboards of history. Political moves may or may not signify. Treaties international are usually effected by skilful diplomacy, foes may be bluffed by naval and military manœuvres; but the art of a nation betrays its innermost confidences—the stuff whereof ’tis made.
If, however, as happened at the Centennial Exposition in 1876, a political advent coincides with one in art, that milestone becomes an epoch-marker extraordinary. In 1876 the arts of the world, for the first time, were made to pass before this people as an alluring pageant, and a general desire to avail ourselves of them returned to replace the vacuum that had existed since the platform of Andrew Jackson denounced the refinements of life as attributes of an overbearing aristocracy, patroons and manor-lords, and necessarily
ULTRA-FASHIONABLE, QUEEN-ANNE ARCHITECTURE.
FASHIONABLE HOUSE—EASTLAKE SCHOOL.
fraught with every danger to a nation’s liberty and strength.