two fire places at each end of the room for experiments in chemistry and philosophy There are stairs leading directly to the philosophical and chemical lecture-room. The other basement is used by three furnaces for heating the building.

The upper, or great hall in the third story, being the full size of the building, is large and commodious, capable of accommodating six hundred persons. A large platform, twenty feet deep, and the width of the building is at the south end of the hall, to be used by scholars on examination day, and for recitation, declamation, and reading their exercises; also, for a stand for lecturers. There is a retiring room behind the platform in the front tower, for scholars to prepare themselves for performing respective parts in dialogue, &c. From this retiring room a flight of stairs ascends to the astronomical observatory.

The rooms in the octagonal towers of the third story are intended for committee

rooms for directory, or for private conference of teachers and parents, or friends, at general exercise, or on examination day. There are two museum rooms in the second story of the transepts, one for males and the other for females.

The entrance or reception room, for strangers and parents, is in the first story of the observatory, or front square tower on Olive street. Over the reception room is the library room. Perfect and thorough ventilation is aimed at, and the latest improvements to attain it, adopted. The stairs are broad and direct, giving free and easy access to, and from the building at all times, and securing against all accidents in case of alarm of fire, &c.

All the finishing of the school-rooms and halls, are grained oak, and varnished. Wardrobe rooms are to be supplied with double clothes' hooks; halls with umbrella racks, troughs, and places for overshoes, all made of cherry and varnished.

PLAN OF THE WELLS SCHOOL, CHICAGO.

THE Wells School building, so called in honor of William H. Wells, the former Superintendent of Schools, is located in the West Division, three miles from the Court House, near the centre of a lot having a frontage on Reuben street of two hundred and fifty feet, and a depth of one hundred and eightythree feet on Cornelia street. It will accommodate nine hundred and forty-five pupils, distributed through fourteen rooms, each furnished with sixty-three single seats and desks. Total cost, $45,575.00.

The building is 69 × 87 feet on the ground, four stories besides the basement, each floor being divided by a corridor (D) into four rooms (A) 27 × 33 feet each, having a wardrobe (B) for the pupils and a teachers' closet (C) attached, except the fourth floor, which has two rooms of the same character, and an assembly hall (E) 65 × 23 feet in area.

The school-rooms are wainscoted five feet and the wardrobes seven feet high, grained and varnished. Every room is ventilated by large shafts in both the exterior and interior walls, and is warmed by a low pressure steam apparatus, the boiler being located in a separate building in the rear.