Rensselaer Standard, Volume 1, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 September 1879 — Mme. Musard’s Hotel. [ARTICLE]

Mme. Musard’s Hotel.

The sale of Mme. Mnsard’s jewels produced a total of $250,684.60. The Parisian received by the last mail says: “The hotel where the sale is taking Slace is an elegant three-story edifice, To. 53 Avenue de Jena. You enter by a lofty porte-cochere, flanked by two well-developed caryatides. The court yard is light and airy; on the right the coach houses, the harness ‘rooms and fine stabling for twenty horses. You enter the house by a double flight of steps surmounted by a commonplace glass fan-roof. The nail is well proportioned. Crossing it you enter the boudoir draped in pink. The Ceiling is painted by Chaplin; so are the panels. The prevailing tone is pink, and the capitone work and drapery is pink. It was Chaplin who painted the ceilings and panels of the private apartments of the Empress Eugenie at the Elysee. Mme. Mus&rd bought the Empress’ famous collier of 475 pearls: Mme. Mus sard was one of the great glories of the Third Empire, and her hotel is a good example of the prodigality of -that epoch. The antechamber is draped in blue; the ceiling is again by Chaplin, as also are the panels; the chimney ornaments are in Dresden china, and the mirror is a very fine piece of Dresden ware. Passing from the Dresden room we enter thesalle-a-manger, a very elegant room, the panels of which are in heavy carved wood stained in two shades of brown and hung with crimson. The furniture in modern boisnoir, elegantly carved and very effective. The lustre is a remarkable piece of white Dresden, and the etagerea are loaded with specimens of Saxe, Sevres, Delft, Japanese and Dresden faience and porcelaine. In the hall we notice a good Zeim, and on the staircase two or three poor examples of that master and a very fine Daubigny. On the first floor to the left is the library, a

very pretty room furnished with inlaid wood bookcases. The ceiling is by Chaplin, and the pictures are by Chaplin and Muraton. The contents of the bookcases are entirely out of harmony with the bookcases themselves —three volume hovels flanked by three volume novels, just like one of the windows of Mudie’s library in Oxford street. Mme. Musard probably did not take kindly to reading and she does not seem to have read French books at all. All the books were the usual red, blue and green fashionable novels with which the firms of Bentley and Tinsley are in the habit of strewing the tables of the English aristocracy. Over the boudoir is a bed room very somberly furnished with a profusion of religious subjects, ivories, paintings and triptychs. The bedstead is of black oak, with laoe hangings and plumes. Tan bedroom, which we took to be that of the late mistress of the house, was hong with deep red curtains and portieres and papered red of a different shade. It is hung all round with pictures, among which is a splendid Daubigny, a very pretty Corot, and a remarkably fine Chaplin representing a group of children. Throughout the house we observe that the pictures are hung in a bad light The floor is covered with an imitation Turkey carpet The bedstead is a small ebony lit-de repos, ornamented with very ordinary faience plaques, imitation of Rouen. The nangings are very ordinary. Over the head ofthe bed is an ivory Christ with a sprig of buisson stuck Iff the arm, a souvenier of last Palm Sunday. The cabinets are of black ebony and modern Parisian lacquer. Hie cabinet de toilette is prettily fitted np In the Chi-

nese style. The washing service is of Sevres porcelain mounted in silver. On each side pf the fire-place is a dressing table and jdaas surmounted by gilded eagles. The pictures in this room are by Ziem, De Beaumont and Chaplin, who must’have made a fine thing out of Mine. Mnsard. His pictures and ceilings mostly bear the date of 1868. The furniture of the hotel to splendid and luxurious, but it does not tend to show that Mme. Musard was a woman of much taste. Some of the

pictures are very fine specimens, and will fetch very high prices, but the knick-knacks and bibelots which were daily in her hands are of the most ordinary and untasteful description. We noticed a number of pistols and arms, and especially quantities of knives of all descriptions, to say nothing of table knives. This is an interesting feet to note, particularly as Mme. Musard hailed from Connecticut, where folks are peculiarly given to whitling.”