When the house was first purchased, the owner went over the inside herself to discover the original lines. As in many houses of the kind, it was easy to restore the size of the room by following beams and knocking out partitions. It must be remembered that the usual plan in houses of that period was to construct a large, square room in the center with small rooms opening off from it which were used as chambers.
The work of decorating, and, as far as possible, the remodeling itself, was done by Mrs. William Otis Kimball and her brother. Along the front of the house a screened, outdoor living-room has been added. The original building consisted of four rooms on the first floor. The front door opened into a small hall, to the right of which was the great living-room, and to the left the dining-room. Back of the former was a guest room, and back of the latter the old kitchen.
[Illustration: Two Views of the Living Room]
In the living-room, the flooring, which was composed of boards often two feet wide, was in such good condition that it was left intact, treated to a black walnut stain, and shellacked. The height of the ceiling was but seven feet; so the heavy beams of swamp oak were boxed in and painted white, and the space between whitewashed. The walls, which were covered with ten tiers of paper, each one uglier than the last, were cleared to the boarding. The last one was found to be a wonderfully fine landscape paper, which showed that an early owner of the house must have been a person of means, who probably had it brought over in one of the merchant-ships during the time of commercial prosperity, when Newburyport had a lively trade with foreign lands. The walls were treated with a water paint colored a creamy pumpkin tint that makes the room seem always well lighted. It is a most inexpensive finish, such as is used by scene painters in a theater, and can be put on with an ordinary-whitewash brush. The wainscot was stained dark brown to harmonize with the floors. Around the top of the room the owner painted a frieze of conventionalized pomegranates, which follow the color scheme of the woodwork and wall. The old fireplace, which had been closed up, was opened, and the over-mantel enriched with a splendidly decorative painting by the artist herself, representing a Normandy boar hunt about 1330.