The unsightliness of the exterior of Buckingham Palace is fortunately redeemed by the interesting and beautiful interior. The central portico gives access to a lofty entrance-hall, lined by a row of double columns of veined white marble, with gilded bases and capitals. The floor is of variegated marble, and on the left is a grand staircase of white marble, with decorations by Ludwig Grüner.
Directly opposite the entrance is the Sculpture Gallery, chiefly filled with busts of royal and eminent persons, and beyond it is the Library or Council-room, richly decorated, and opening on to a terrace with a chapel at one end and a conservatory at the other.
The large Ball-room, on the south side of the entrance-hall was completed in 1856, after designs by Sir James Pennethorne, with internal decorations by Grüner. It contains Vandyck's portraits of Charles I. and his wife, and Winterhalter's of her present Majesty and the late Prince Consort.
The State Apartments, entered from the grand staircase, include the Green Drawing-room, 50 ft. long, by 35 ft. high, named after the colour of its decorations; the Throne-room, 64 ft. long, with a white marble frieze, designed by Stothard, and executed by Baily, and an arched ceiling richly decorated; the Picture Gallery, containing a very fine collection of masterpieces of painting, such as Albrecht Durer's altar-piece, representing the "Assumption of the Virgin;" Rubens' "St. George and the Dragon," "Falconer," and "Pan and Syrinx;" Rembrandt's "Shipbuilder and his Wife," "Burgomaster Pancras and his Wife," "Nole me Tangere," and "Adoration of the Virgin ;" Vandyck's "Marriage of St. Catherine," "Portrait of a Man in Black," and "Christ healing the Lame Man;" Sir D. Wilkie's "Penny Wedding," and "Blind-man's Buff," etc. etc.
The so-called Queen's Gallery, a corridor more than 150 ft. long, contains a very choice collection of works by Dutch and Flemish masters, such as Maes, Hobhema, Cuyp, the Vanderveldes, Ruysdael, Potter, Backhuysen, Berghem, Both, Douw, Teniers, Terburg, etc.; and Her Majesty's private apartments are enriched by portraits by Vandyck, Lely, Kneller, Gainsborough, Copley, Lawrence, and others.
Of the remaining State Apartments, the most noteworthy are the Yellow Drawing-room, on the north of the palace, decorated with Corinthian columns of purple scagliola, the South Drawing room ,with mural sculptures in high relief by Pitts, and the Dining-room, lined with mirrors, and with windows opening on to the garden.
The palace gardens and pleasure grounds occupy some forty acres of ground, and include a fine lake, covering five acres, by the side of which rises the celebrated summer-house, with a minaret roof, and several rooms, one decorated with frescoes illustrating Milton's Comus, by Eastlake, Landseer, Dyce, Stanfield, Uwins, Leslie, and Ross, and another with scenes from Sir Walter Scott's novels and poems.