Page:The House of the Lord.djvu/202

186 room is comfortably carpeted but in marked simplicity,—without a suggestion of bright color. The seats are folding lecture chairs, of plain design, and provision is made for two hundred and fifty persons. This room is used for preliminary instruction purposes, and may be called for convenience the Lower Lecture Room.

The Garden Room: In striking contrast with the room last described is the apartment on the south, entered from the lecture room by an arched doorway hung with portieres. While of about the same size as the room described, and seated to accommodate the same number of persons, in all its appointments it is of more elaborate design. Ceiling and walls are embellished with oil paintings—the former to represent clouds and sky, with sun and moon and stars; the latter showing landscape scenes of rare beauty. There are sylvan grottoes and mossy dells, lakelets and brooks, waterfalls and rivulets, trees, vines and flowers, insects, birds and beasts, in short, the earth beautiful,—as it was before the Fall. It may be called the Garden of Eden Room, for in every part and appurtenance it speaks of sweet content and blessed repose. There is no suggestion of disturbance, enmity or hostility; the beasts are at peace and the birds live in amity. In the centre of the south wall, is a platform and an altar of prayer, reached by three steps. The altar is upholstered in velvet, and on it rests the Holy Bible. On the sides of the altar are large doorways opening directly into a conservatory of living plants.

The Grand Stairway starts near the south end of the lower corridor already described. It is provided with a stately newel post and a massive balustrade, both of solid cherry. This stairway comprises thirty-five steps with