l Society, and later membership in that
society became requisite to eligibility for the Wistar Parties.

By far the handsomest old city residence of brick that remains in
anything like its original condition is the so-called Morris house at
Number 225 South Eighth Street between Walnut and Spruce streets.
Although not built until very shortly after the struggle for American
independence had been won, it is pre-Revolutionary in character and
Colonial in style throughout. In elegance and distinction the facade is
unexcelled in early American city architecture. Unlike most houses of
the time and locality, it has a double front with two windows each side
of a central doorway, a range of five windows on the second and third
floors and three simple dormers in the gable roof above. The windows
have twelve-paned upper and lower sashes with paneled shutters on the
first and second stories, and foreshortened eight-paned upper and lower
sashes without shutters on the third story.

The brickwork is of characteristic Flemish bond with alternating red
stretcher and black header bricks. Two slightly projecting courses, two
courses apart, form horizontal belts at the second-and third-floor
levels, while the first thirteen courses above the sidewalk level
project somewhat beyond the wall above and are laid up in running bond,
every sixth course being a tie course of headers. Beautifully tooled,
light stone lintels with fine-scale radial scorings greatly enhance the
beauty of the fenestration. Each lintel appears to consist of seven
gauged or keyed pieces each, but is in reality a single stone, the
effect being secured by deep scorings. A heavy molded cornice and
handsome gutter spouts complete the decorative features apart from the
chaste pedimental doorway with its fluted pilasters and dainty fanlight,
which is mentioned again in another chapter. A rolling way and areaways
at the basement windows pierce the wall at the sidewalk level after the
manner of the time. Indoors, the hall extends entirely through the house
to a door in the rear opening upon a box-bordered garden with rose trees
and old-fashioned flowers. There is a parlor on the right of the hall
and a library on the left. Back of the latter is the dining room, while
the kitchen and service portion of the house are located in an L
extension to the rear.

As indicated by two marble date stones set in the third-story front wall
just below the cornice, this house was begun in 1