The floor, evidently modern, was laid in large squares of white wood bordered with strips of oak.

The ceiling, formed of many oval panels, in each of which Van Huysum had carved a grotesque mask, had been respected and allowed to keep the brown tones of the native Dutch oak.
In the four corners of this parlor were truncated columns, supporting candelabra exactly like those on the mantle-shelf; and a round table stood in the middle of the room.

Along the walls card-tables were symmetrically placed.

On two gilded consoles with marble slabs there stood, at the period when this history begins, two glass globes filled with water, in which, above a bed of sand and shells, red and gold and silver fish were swimming about.

The room was both brilliant and sombre.
The ceiling necessarily absorbed the light and reflected none.