At
this moment the city fathers and the committee of the new buildings
at Bailey's Beach are wrangling as gayly as in Governor Lawrence's
day over a bit of wall lately constructed across the end of
Bellevue Avenue. A new expedient has been hit upon by some of the
would-be exclusive owners of the cliffs; they have lowered the
"walk" out of sight, thus insuring their own privacy and in no way
interfering with the rights of the public.
Among the gentlemen who settled in Newport about Governor
Lawrence's time was Lord Baltimore (Mr. Calvert, he preferred to
call himself), who remained there until his death. He was shy of
referring to his English peerage, but would willingly talk of his
descent through his mother from Peter Paul Rubens, from whom had
come down to him a chateau in Holland and several splendid
paintings. The latter hung in the parlor of the modest little
dwelling, where I was taken to see them and their owner many years
ago. My introducer on this occasion was herself a lady of no
ordinary birth, being the daughter of Stuart, our greatest portrait
painter. I have passed many quiet hours in the quaint studio (the
same her father had used), hearing her prattle - as she loved to do
if she found a sympathetic listener - of her father, of Washington
and his pompous ways, and the many celebrities who had in turn
posed before Stuart's easel.
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