ntry, resigned his
commission upon the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
Following the evacuation of Philadelphia by the British he was arrested,
charged with assisting the British forces and tried for high treason,
but was acquitted and allowed to retain possession of his estates,
which were duly inherited by his family on his death in 1811.

These charming old ledge-stone mansions, and others of lesser
architectural merit and historical association, too numerous for
description here, constitute the chief distinction of Philadelphia
architecture. Whereas the city residences of brick differ little from
those of several other not far distant places, and the country houses of
that material recall many similar ones in Delaware, Maryland and even
Virginia, the ledge-stone house of greater Philadelphia is a thing unto
itself. It has no parallel in America. Of substantial character and
possessed of rare local color, it combines with picturesque appearance
those highly desirable qualities of permanence and non-inflammability.
It is the ideal construction for suburban Philadelphia where the
necessary building material abounds and new homes can live in accord
with the old.

[Illustration: PLATE XXX.--Doorway, Doctor Denton's House, Germantown.]

[Illustration: PLATE XXXI.--West Entrance, Mount Pleasant, Fairmount
Park; East Entrance, Mount Pleasant.]

CHAPTER V

PLASTERED STONE COUNTRY HOUSES

It is quite possible to preserve random shapes and rock faces in
stonework that is structurally good, yet still fail in a measure to
please the eye and satisfy the artistic sense. A house built of stones
which, although irregular and of variable size, are generally cubical in
shape and set with obvious painstaking to simulate a casual yet
remarkably systematic arrangement, never fails to be clumsy and patchy.
A case in point is Waynesborough in Easttown Township, Chester County,
erected in 1724 by Captain Isaac Wayne. Greame Park, erected in Horsham
Township, Montgomery County, by Sir William Keith five years after he
was appointed governor of Penn's Colony in 1717, instances another
unsuccessful use of stonework and effectively explodes the pet notion of
the indiscriminate that everything which is old is therefore good. The
promiscuous use of rough, long, quarried stones, square blocks and
narrow strips on end results in an utterly irrational effect, a
confusing medley of short lines.

Going to the other extreme