LIBRARY AT WAYSIDE.LIBRARY AT WAYSIDE.
when I felt rather better than usual, and went downstairs determined to conquer or die in the attempt. Dear readers! if you could only have seen that room you would, some of you, never have believed in me again for one single moment. The centre table was heaped with books, old papers and magazines. The matting on the floor had one long, thin and solitary rug. There were aimless cretonne curtains at the window, which couldn’t possibly be reached, because the desk was stuck right against it; and, worst fault of all, the door opened on the wrong side, and so whenever it was open the fire was as it were in the passage. And as had been rightly said, there was not a single place to put a chair; and, indeed, the untidy thing in the photograph was the only specimen of the genus that the chamber possessed, if we except an ordinary bedroom seat, and another of a similar kind by the desk, neither of which could be sat upon, save by an individual who had serious writing to do. Then someone had placed in one corner a deck-lounge, in, I suppose, a feeble attempt at being happy, and never did a lounge less deserve its name. It waslocated between the window and the fire, and therefore succeeded in nothing, save in being entirely out of place and in the way. There too the shelves for books were left as shown in the photograph, and had none of the small curtains over the smaller recesses, so necessary to break up the lines and to serve as hiding-places for old and way-worn literature. The fireplace was hideous, and a Moloch as regards coal, while, of course the room could never be brought above freezing pitch, because of the relative positions of the fireplace, door, and window, each of which was put just exactly where it ought not to be. The design and colour of the room were right enough, but the touches which turn a room into a habitation were never more conspicuous by their absence.
I don’t know how it is, but I can put a room straight in five minutes when another person merely grumbles and declares that nothing can be done; and in a pious rage I set to work and very soon had made a considerable alteration in the place. Although, of course, much could not be accomplished until I sent for myfactotum Joe, and had the door moved to the other side, that elegant plaster in the ceiling dislodged, and the hideous tiles in the grate renovated. Then I had a good thickportièreplaced inside the door, hung the pictures properly, arranged the books and china, put the curtains where they were required in the bookcase, altered the window-curtains, put the desk on one side, not in the very centre of the window, and imported a couple of deep, good basket-chairs from Heelas, of Reading, and some smaller Liberty chairs and tables. The centre table was put on one side, and not in the middle of the room, with magazines and newspapers; and after that I put down proper and suitable rugs, instead of the big one,—beautiful in itself and in its proper place which was a passage—but ridiculous in the middle of a matted floor, where it resembled nothing so much as a garden walk. Since then the room has been more used than any other sitting-room in the house, and is now pronounced one of the most comfortable in the dreary little place, or, I should say, in what was a dreary little place until it was taken vigorously in hand. Albeit,nothing can make the house a real success, because it is built east and west, and with all the windows to the west and to the north and south: these, by the way, raking the back yards of the neighbours fore and aft: while, except for the bath-room window, there is not one which looks towards the east, where, of course, one gets the pleasantest view and the morning sun: a great consideration in a house which is literally a summer house, and where therefore, the western sun is useless and tormenting. Even in the winter an afternoon sun is no earthly use, for by the time it comes round to the western windows it has to retire ignominiously into a bank of fog or cloud; therefore such a house as this especial one should never be taken unless the owner will close the north and north-west windows, and open out big square bows on the south and south-eastern aspect in the manner the windows should have been placed when the house was built. It is always a pleasing reflection to me that the man who designed this house is dead, and cannot now make any other person as miserable by his awkward vagaries as he has made me.If he had simply consented to one or two alterations, and had given us decent grates, and proper servants’ accommodation, the house wouldn’t have been ‘half bad,’ and I do not suppose would have cost a farthing more to build than it cost at first. The cornices were so terrible that they had in some cases to be cut away and reduced to one-fourth, while the elaborate and expensive style in which they had been liberally picked out in all the colours of the rainbow, was obliterated by colour-wash at once; yet the money spent on this ‘decoration’ would have gone some way towards new grates; and my pet plain wooden mantels would not have cost half what the monstrous marble ones did, with which one can’t wrestle, because of the round openings in the mantelpieces, which would not allow of the cheap introduction of the pretty, square, slow-combustion stoves, with plain tiles, to which I must confess I am absolutely devoted. I think, if their third room in any way resembles the one illustrated here, this picture will help my readers very much, if they are anxious to have a library, a room where the master can sit and smoke, and where business people can beinterviewed. But, if books are not plentiful, and the husband doesn’t smoke and is not much at home, the room would not be of very much service to the mistress and her girls, should she be fortunate enough to be the proud possessor of grown-up daughters. And there are, of course, yet other means of treating and disposing of the room. If children are numerous, and bedrooms few, this third room may have to be taken for schoolroom purposes, or, at best, may have to be used by boys and girls in the holidays, or when lessons have to be prepared, and in this case it would require quite different treatment to what it would receive were it merely a pretty sitting-room, as it should most undoubtedly be.
If the sitting-room aspect has to be considered it should be made as bright and charming as possible, and should be furnished with an eye to the particular occupation of the house mistress, who is sure to have some idiosyncrasy, and will either work, write or ‘housekeep’ indefatigably. If she does this latter, she will want room for her householdbooks, her receipt books, and her house books, containing all kinds of hints as to what to do and when to do it, which any woman collects if she is in the least house-proud and anxious to make the most of her surroundings. In this case, one of the recesses could be fitted with shelves on the same principle as those shown in the photograph, but they should not be higher than the mantelpiece, and where there is a gaping space, curtains should be hung, or else doors placed to make a species of cupboard with copper hinges and a good lock. In the other recess a writing-table could be placed, with some shelves above it to hold books of reference, and this table must be furnished with really good locks, for here should be kept account and cheque books, and receipts and any private unanswered letters. Though let me once more impress on all my readers never to keep any save business letters, and never to keep those when the business to which they refer is completely done with and ended. No one knows how long he or she may live, nor if sudden death or illness maynot leave all one’s secrets, should one have any, or the secrets of others, open to anyone who may have access to one’s belongings; besides, we have no right to keep other folk’s letters, once they are replied to. We may ourselves be secrecy itself, but we cannot answer for the secret-keeping capacity of our nearest and dearest.
If the window should be, as I hope it may be, one of the delightful Caldecott ones, it should have a straight window-seat arranged exactly as in this sketch, and thus we should be provided with a most comfortable place to rest in, more especially if we supplement it with several big Liberty pillows. These can be covered in plain linen covers, edged with frills of the same or of Torchon lace. If this latter be used, a wide insertion should be laid on all round the pillows, about an inch from where the lace is sewn on. The lace must not be too full. If the pillow should be a yard square, or the more ordinary size of three-quarters of a yard, the quantity of lace used should be one-half longer than the length of the sides of the pillow,i.e., 6 yards of lacewould be wanted for a pillow the sides of which measured 4 yards, while 3 yards would be sufficient for the smaller size, as the lace is only just fulled on. It should not be heavily gathered, or it will not look well.
Beautiful pillows can be made by Miss Goodban, of 9 Westbourne Terrace Road, Hyde Park of these same linens. She embroiders them all over in flax and edges them with Torchon, and if these cases are simply buttonedon like an ordinary pillowcase they can be washed in an hour and replaced. Liberty silk covers also wash splendidly if one has a careful maid. I have never sent mine to the ordinary wash; but washed at home they came out of the trial as good as new; a fact I do not think many people can know, or we should not see as many dirty covers as we do in the houses of folks who ought to know a great deal better. The window-seat cover should be of some hard-wearing material, such as ribbed and stamped Victoria cord, or a really good all-wool tapestry. It is never the least use to use one of the cheap tapestries provided so lavishly nowadays for this purpose, for if we do, we shall at once be terribly disappointed by the effect. For these seats in most rooms have a great deal of wear and in consequence if a cheap stuff is used it will not last any time. To ensure real and satisfactory length of days for any material, we must have one made of all wool, and not wool and cotton mixed. The actual expense of these seats, and indeed of anyfitted seat, is the upholstress’s time and work, which costs as much if the material is only 1s. a yard, as it does if one pays a guinea for the same amount, besides which there is the continual worry of the British workman amongst us. Though why women should not be their own upholstresses I for one can’t think, and I should strongly advise any girl about to marry on limited means to learn to make up her own covers and cushions as well as how to cook the dinner. Then if the husband has a knowledge of carpentering and is handy about the house, the place can always look nice at one-third the expense it would cost were a workman or workwoman sent for when the smallest alterations were required.
Given the window-seat there should be no need for a sofa, and that is a decided consideration, but whatever chairs are had they should be comfortable ones, and none are better than the excellent wicker ones of which I have so often spoken. If expense be a great object one can frequently buy these chairs from travelling hawkers who go about the country with vans of chairstables and baskets, and sell these special chairs for about 5s. or 6s. in wicker, simply stained a faint brown, which said staining I much prefer to paint or enamel, as it never becomes in the least shabby. A cushion must be made to fit the seat finished off with a 4 or 5 inch frill, not any deeper, and another cushion must be made to fit the back, while another must be placed round the sides of the chair, properly stuffed and ‘buttoned down.’ This said buttoning down can be done by an amateur if she purchases the proper needles for the purpose and secures the buttons with very strong packthread. And I consider such cushions should all be made in this style, as a plain surface wears out twice as soon as one that is arranged with buttons; while, if one is clean and careful, the buttons need not mean an accumulation of dust and dirt, both being got rid of perfectly well if the cushions are properly brushed and beaten and attended to by a housemaid who knows her work. By the way, it takes 2¼ yards of double-width material to make a cover for an ordinary wicker chair, or 4½ of single width material or of cretonne, but I cannotadvise cretonne for the purpose, or for any real hard wear on any chairs, it so very soon becomes dirty, and is always in the wash-tub and in the hands of the upholstress. If the room is very tiny the window-seat can be furnished with three deep drawers in which we can keep any amount of odds and ends. Of course, the number of the drawers will depend on the length of the window-seat, but three should be the outside number. In any case they would come just under the seat and be hidden from observation either by the deep frill or a woollen fringe, and should open and shut very easily indeed. In a small house these drawers would be invaluable for one of the principal drawbacks to a suburban residence is the fact that there are no cupboards in them, neither are there many recesses which we can utilise as wardrobes should we require to do so. Let us suppose that this special room is given over to the mistress of the house and that she is content to have the ever-delightful shade of ‘Panton’ blue, than which nothing is better in every way to live with, she would then have the short curtains shown in the pictureof some yellow material, Wallace’s diamond serge for choice, lined with sateen or plain serge, if there be many draughts or very much sun: then the material for the window-seat should be in golden brown or turquoise blue stamped Victoria cord, and the cushions should be in yellow, blue and pink linen, worked in very coarse and thick real flax by Miss Goodban. If the room has very much traffic, the floor should have a surround of plain brown cork carpet, with a good blue square of Wallace’s Dunelm carpet in the centre, just lightly fastened down in such a manner that it can be easily removed for shaking. Personally, I never like nails put in any carpet; they cannot help spoiling and tearing it, and it is far better to sew on the carpet itself a succession of tiny bits of tape, of course on the wrong side, and close to the edge. In these pieces of tape should the nails be placed. The tapes can always be renewed, and in this case the edge of the carpet is never touched, and cannot present the ‘worried’ appearance which characterises so many really good floor coverings. In this special room the carpet shouldbe in a special shade of blue, which would harmonise with the paper. There are two or three different ways of treating the walls of such a room, and the one I prefer is to have electric turquoise Aspinall for all the paint, the Panton blue paper, and a floral frieze with a great deal of yellow in it; or, again, one can have the blue paper, but with real ivory paint, and an anaglypta dado painted in the same shade instead of the frieze; while a really useful and hard-wearing room may have a soft brown dado, and all soft brown paint, and a darker blue paper. In this case both paper and paint must be selected by someone who understands the science of colour. The brown should have a good deal of cream in it, and the blue should have a great deal of indigo and not any shade of green or turquoise at all. Here the window-seat cushion should be covered in brown stamped Victoria cord, and the curtains should be in blue serge or Tanjore cloth. I have never yet found a blue serge which would stand sun, and not fade in a couple of weeks in the most distressing manner, while almost anyyellow serge stands the sunshine, and I can myself guarantee Wallace’s diamond serge in yellow, for that has proved itself absolutely fast. Shoolbred guarantees the Tanjore cloth, but personally I have had no experience of this material, having had neither opportunity nor occasion to try it. It is 4s. 9d. a yard, and is very pretty to look at; and is besides a most excellent width. Need I say that any cornice in this room must be simply coloured cream, and the ceiling papered in some inexpensive and pretty yellow and white paper? If blue should be objected to, or one is tired of it, a very pretty sitting-room can be made from any floral paper which is really good, and,Isay, hand-made. I am devoted to a beautiful heliotrope and green clematis paper sold by Smee & Cobay, and also to the ‘ragged robin’ paper sold by Haines, and either of these papers should be used above a dado of some kind or other. A full green sateen curtain dado is the best, and in this case all the paint should be the same shade of green as that chosen for the dado, and that should be one of the tints in the leaves on the paper itself. Then the carpet and curtains should be green,and so should be the window-seat and the ceiling paper. The other shades in the paper should appear in the cushions and table-covers: although as regards the clematis paper I have never come across any good heliotrope materials, and have only found this colour in silk and in a capital cretonne sold by the Cavendish House Company, Cheltenham. I fancy that Warings, of Liverpool, have also a good ‘lilac’ cretonne. They certainly possess an admirable wall-paper with lilacs on a striped background, which should not be forgotten by anyone who thinks of using that always satisfactory decorative harmony of heliotrope and green. If there is not much wear in these rooms, I should advise the green ‘Isis’ matting as a background for rugs, but if there be a great deal of traffic, the soft green ‘Roman carpet’ sold by Shoolbred does excellently with some sort of a ‘surround’ which is easily cleaned, such as Jackson’s varnish stains, or plain cream matting, or plain cork carpet, according to the state of the floor and the particular tastes of the owner of the room, who should of course have one of Giles’s removable parqueterie surroundsif she can afford it. In any case she must never allow either a fitted carpet or a patterned surround to fidget the eye, avoiding as a real sin against the first principles of art, those terrible materials which imitate parqueterie or tiles, or pretend to be anything save what they are, and giving a wide berth to felt, an admirable material to look at, but a fearful and abominable dust-trap. So indeed are fluffy materials of any sort or kind if they cannot be cleaned without sweeping or by the friendly aid of a damp duster, which just passed over them once a day, keeps the stain or matting or cork carpet in order, and prevents the accumulation in corners that must ensue if we have not a washable material as a surround to whatever carpet we may select. If we have matting all over the floor, it is well to recollect that salt and water form an excellent mixture to use to cleanse it with, the salt in some way preserving and toughening the fibres of the matting as well as cleaning it in a most effectual style.
The principal things to recollect in this, and, indeed in any room are, first, that it must bemade draught-proof and be properly ventilated, that we must so arrange that the door does not open right on the fire, that while the furniture may be as simple as we like, everything must be made to harmonise, being either bought for or adapted to the room itself and the special occupations of the room’s mistress. Fortunately if our purses are light, there is abundance of inexpensive furniture in these days which I cannot, I feel, praise too highly. I remember the dreadful struggles I had, to make my own first house pretty some six-and-twenty years ago, when there was nothing to be had but heavy wood and solid repps, and no one had whispered ‘Liberty,’ or mentioned serge, or bamboo and wicker furniture, or, if they had, had murmured it so gently that the murmur had not reached the ears of anyone at all. Now, scoff as one may at wicker work and bamboo, I venture to say that by them lies the way of salvation for the third room in an impecunious household. I have bought the most charming and beautiful little cupboard tables at Shoolbred’s, the most comfortable and excellentchairs at Smee & Cobay’s, at Heelas, of Reading, and at Wallace’s, which have all the delights of a real upholstered expensive arm-chair, if one has the cushions made at home, at as many shillings as the other costs pounds. While the most useful bookcase I ever came across is also matting and bamboo, and this can have a species of cupboard shelf made by hanging a curtain over the third receptacle for books, which said curtain is like charity: it covers a multitude of sins in the shape of rolls of wall paper, odds and ends of patterns, and old books which have seen better days, and yet are not good enough to re-bind, and yet are too good to throw away. Indeed, no book should ever be treated in such an ignominious fashion. At the worst it can be sent to a hospital, or be kept in our own special hospital box, which should be in every house, for how can we tell when infectious disease may not find us out? In that case we shall be thankful to be possessed of something to read which we can afterwards burn without anyarrière penséein the matter at all.
One thing should be in every morning-room, orthird room, or library, call this little chamber by what name we will; and that is an invaluable small closing-table I have discovered in Kensington High Street. It costs about 4s. 11d., simply stained dark brown, can be folded up and put against a wall, or laid under a sofa when not in use, and is altogether most unobtrusive and excellent, for it can be set up in one second, and is admirable for a thousand purposes. I think it is large enough to ‘cut out’ upon, although I am not an authority on the subject of work. I know it is extremely handy for tea, and that one can make scrapbooks upon it, and write upon it too, while as it can be folded and put on one side at any moment, it does not get over-crowded with books and ornaments, and is therefore always available. The ordinary small occasional table never can be that, for it is usually clad in a nice square table-cover and has flowers or a plant in the centre, and has moreover, every available corner filled with books and ‘twos and threes,’ while the modest and retiring folding-table only comes out for use, and is never ornamental, and willnot be used otherwise than for the purpose for which it is made. Of course the walnut Sutherland table is much nicer in every way, but is not to be had under 30s., is often of most inferior wood liable to scratches and spots, and is also all too often opened out clad in its tablecloth and ornamented to death. But we have no qualms about the little cheap folding-table. If it is scratched and spotted it can be scrubbed clean and given a new coat of Jackson’s varnish stain and be in a moment as good as new if not better. Just one worden parenthése, as it were, about stains. Do not let anything anyone can say induce you to attempt the beautiful green staining we all so much admire at home, for if you do, it can be nothing but a most ghastly failure. True, the particular piece of furniture will be green, but such a green! for the proper effect can only be obtained in the same way really good French polish is procured, and that, as everyone knows, can never be got save by a professional hand who knows the work, and has never yet been known to divulge the secret of success. No; the green stain is not for theamateur, be sure of that, while the ‘oak,’ and ‘dark oak,’ and ‘walnut’ varnish stains are exactly all that they ought to be.
In this room a screen by the door is often a most blessed possession, and as screens can be bought so cheaply nowadays everyone can avail herself of the comfort procured by a judicious use of them. Liberty first, and Shoolbred next, should be searched for an inexpensive screen, for sometimes Liberty has none, and then Shoolbred may come to the rescue, or our experience of both shops may be reversed; it all depends on which place has had the last consignment from Japan. I bought a beautiful screen at Liberty’s one year, about a month before Christmas, for 18s. 9d., but on applying for another in the following March, found all were sold out, and I had to go farther afield, discovering the one I wanted in a shop in High Street, Kensington, the name of which I have forgotten. True both Liberty and Shoolbred had plenty of screens but neither had an inexpensive one, with a back warranted to resist the frequent and uncalled-for assaults of the British housemaid. By theway, a screen should always be placed behind the door, which should in most cases open from left to right into a room if the room is in the least degree like the one illustrated. I am not fond of a door opening into a hall, and of course the perfect door should not open, but slide into the wall, but perfection is a word never heard, and certainly not understood at all in the usual suburb.
If the room be blue, theportièreshould be of printed velveteen in shades of yellow. With a floral paper it may be pink or green, but in any case a plain material should not be employed as aportière. One should always have a figured stuff there, and if one can afford it one cannot improve on the aforesaid velveteen.Portièresshould be made up by a really competent hand and should be lined, and edged with either ‘grip-cord’ or fan-edging, as ball fringe is apt to come to grief in this situation, theportièrebeing often caught in the door, or as often grasped either by the parlour-maid as she announces a visitor or by any small child who may have to open or close the door. I may seem to speak unduly on the subject both ofportièresand screensbut unless they are employed freely, I can assure my readers they will never circumvent the ordinary suburban residence, but that if both are used, any house, even the most jerry-built one which ever disgraced a ‘Park,’ or blotted the erst-while fair appearance of a ‘Grove,’ can be made habitable. Without these aids to health, to say nothing of decoration, such a house would be an impossible home for anyone not born and bred in the Arctic regions; while outside blinds, if they can only be just nailed uppro tem., and be mere grass mats bought for a few shillings at Treloar’s, can circumvent extreme heat, which often is as bad to bear in these terrible houses as the excessive cold and draughts which characterise them. I know that as a rule three years sets the suburban tenant on the prowl, and, as I said before, the mere idea that such can be the case prevents many a woman from making her house either pretty to look at or even weather-tight. But three years’ experience of untoward weather in a jerry-built structure can undermine the health of any woman, whereas she probably would not move and would certainly keep much better in health ifnot entirely well, did she do her utmost to get over the drawbacks at once. At the same time the hall must be warmed by using the small, portable stove sold by Wolff & Sons, 119 New Bond Street, if it is out of the question to obtain warmth from a real fire-place, and very great care must be given to ventilation by wide-open windows whenever it is possible, and it is always possible during some part of the day: and by ventilators, as suggested before, which should always be open at night, especially when lamps are lighted and fires kept up. For an unventilated room means a sleepy head, and dulness and stupidity instead of the liveliness which should characterise a gathering of the family when the work of the day is safely over and done.
Wellmay the heart of the ordinary mother of a family sink within her shoes when she sees the regulation rooms provided for the use of the children! Nay, one can hardly believe that they are meant for them at all, for nowhere are two rooms placed in such a manner as to make real day and night nurseries, and she is lucky indeed who has not to place one room on the first, and the other on the second floor, thus making it impossible for the nurse to look after the children or their garments in the manner she would be able to do were both rooms on the same storey. But it is always possible to have them on the same storey if convention is defied, and the ‘spare room’ is relegated to the attics, or the nurseries themselves are placed there; and moreover no considerations of any ‘spare room’ should prevent there beinga couple of nurseries in any house. It is odious never to be able to entertain one’s friends even for the usual Saturday to Monday visit so dear to the heart of the ordinary suburban resident; but it is far worse to keep the children in one room only, alike for day and night use, and I sincerely hope that this unhealthy and disagreeable practice may soon cease entirely to exist. If in a tiny house and with one baby only, a second room cannot possibly be had, the only way to arrange matters is to proceed on the lines of a Harrow boy’s room, and to have either a system of ‘fitments,’ or to shut all the washing and dressing apparatus into a cupboard sort of arrangement, and to have one of the small folding iron beds, with a wire mattress complete, which cost about 16s. 6d., and which can be put under another bed in another room during the daytime, the mattress and other bedding being folded up and disposed of in a similar way. Yet in such a wee house as this, the baby would usually be in the mother’s room, and the nurse could share a room with another maid, having her meals in the servants’ sitting-room or the kitchen, while the motherherself looked after the infant. But I fancy where this would be the case, decoration would not be a study, all the energies of the mistress being spent, and very properly too, on making both ends of the income meet if that be possible. At the same time, I can never see why a cottage need not be pretty and comfortable, and I hope that no one will be debarred from attempting to possess a pretty house because she is poor. Pretty things are nowadays as cheap, nay often cheaper, than ugly ones, and it only requires common-sense and the possession of a certain amount of taste to ensure that a house shall be both artistic and comfortable. Let us take first the unfortunate who really can only have one nursery, and who has to allow the child to sleep there at night with the nurse, for I always think it is unwise for the parents to have an infant in their bedroom even when it is very small. A man’s rest broken, means bad work during the day, while a woman is unfit for anything and certainly cannot do her work if she has had no sleep during the orthodox hours of repose. In this case the best room in the upper partof the house should be taken for the nursery; it should be as near the mother’s room as possible, and if there be a dressing-room attached, so much the better in every way, for out of that can be constructed the very necessary nursery pantry. Therein can be kept everything which is in any way unsightly, and it is possible that all signs of the nursery itself being used for a double purpose can be concealed, if one has at one’s service just an ordinary bedroom and dressing-room. We will therefore suppose that, in the first place, the suburban villa contains a bed and a dressing-room, and another bedroom and a bathroom on the same floor. In this case, I should propose that the so-called ‘best room,’ with the dressing-room, should be given over to the nurse and child, the master of the house having the bathroom entirely for his own use as dressing-room. If this arrangement is made, the bedroom which I trust may face south or south-east, can be treated entirely as a day-room, and be properly and prettily painted and papered. Under no circumstances should one of those fearsome ‘nursery’ papers be allowed, neither must a cheap and vulgar flower paper be
COMBINED DAY AND NIGHT NURSERY.COMBINED DAY AND NIGHT NURSERY.
used. If expense is a great object, and it would be probably in such a wee establishment, an inexpensive, geometrical-patterned paper must be chosen, with as little real pattern on it as is possible, great attention being given to the colour; which after all is the principal thing to think about in all decoration. For such papers, one cannot improve on the ‘Olive Leaf’ papers, sold always by Godfrey Giles; and though these special colourings have been obtainable for quite ten years, I have never found anything which would quite take their place. They are 9d. and 1s. 6d. a piece. I advise the latter, the extra 9d. quite doubling the time that the paper will really wear. Some of Liberty’s damasque papers are also most suitable for these and, indeed, for any rooms; but these are 2s., and, in consequence, would cost more to put up. Lower than 1s. 6d. I cannot think it is wise to go, for after all, the great expense of papering is the labour, and the vagaries of the British workman render it undesirable that we shall have to employ him more than we can possibly help. For, once he is in the house, heaven only knows whenhe will leave; and while he is there, everything is disorganised, the maids being engrossed by him and his doings and his followers, and nothing going on in its accustomed and regular routine. I am very fond of the soft apricot shade in the damasque papers, and should often advise one of these used with either real ivory orcafé-au-laitpaint. At first, one need not put a dado, especially if the room be prepared for ‘number one,’ as that can always be added later on, when the room begins to look a little shabby round the base of the wall. Then if the master knows how to use his hands at all, he can simply screw on a dado rail, made of the ever-useful ‘goehring,’ while the mistress can make a full curtain dado of some inexpensive blue and cream cretonne. Oetzmann often has one at about 5¾d. a yard. This is easily made up, a very deep flounce is manufactured, and a yard and a half of cretonne suffice for a yard of dado. It should be slightly gathered on a tape, and the width of the cretonne makes the depth of the dado. On the tape are sewn very small rings, and these are passed over brass-headed nails putclose under the dado-rail, which should be painted after it is fixed, the heads of the screws being covered with putty also painted over; this effectually conceals all traces of them. It is easy for anyone to calculate the cost of such a dado exactly; but, as I said before it can always be added to a room, should it not be advisable on the score of expense to put it up at first. If the soft apricot paper is selected and the room is a very sunny one, I should advise blue Bolton sheeting curtains from Burnett, made double and edged with grip cord, as most undoubtedly anything in such a room should be capable of being washed, while a square blue ‘Dunelm’ carpet should be laid in the centre of the floor, the outer space being covered with plain brown cork carpet. On no account should a nursery be covered with linoleum, oilcloth or cork carpet; a real woollen carpet should bede rigueur. Nothing is worse for a child to creep on than the cold surface of any material which resembles oilcloth, while it is the fault of the nurse entirely should a carpet be spoiled in any way. So, should the mother find the carpet becoming the worse for unfairtreatment during the first eighteen months of a child’s life, she must realise that her nurse is to blame, and that a woman who permits such ‘accidents’ is unfit for her position, and should take some situation where the spotless carefulness and cleanliness which should mark anyone who has the care of a child are not required. For be well assured, if a nurse be careless and untidy in one way she will have these same failings in all she has to do. A nurse may herself look the picture of all she ought to be, but if her rooms bear the least signs of neglect, if the child is not ‘turned out’ like a new pin, and has not perfect ‘manners’ by the time it is a year old, she must go. Unless she does, there will never be peace in the nursery, neither will the children ever be well. People may feel inclined to scoff at the notion that a child’s health can depend on its appearance; but this is a fact, and no amount of scoffing will alter it. If, for example, you see a child sent out with untidy boots, coarse stockings in which there may be a hole or two, and which said stockings are not pulled up trimly and correctly under the shortskirts or the neat little knickerbockers; if the under-garments are showing either at waist or knee, if the clothes are unbrushed and awry and the hair unkempt, send the nurse away at once. If she be careless about the looks of the children she will be careless about their health. Her rooms will be either stuffy or draughty; she will not discriminate about the children’s food or their times of sleep or play; she will not see the boots are repaired and the clothes aired; she is utterly untrustworthy.
I have had a large experience of people of all kinds, and I can honestly say I have never found a sloven a good servant, or an untidy woman one who could be trusted in any position in one’s household. Bad as this fault is in anyone, it is desperate indeed where children are concerned, and should therefore never be endured for a moment. The nurse who is really fit for her post takes as much pride in the children’s appearance as the mother does herself. Should she not do so, colds are incessant, and small illnesses frequent, while should there be an infant matters are still worse, for the baby’s bottles are sure to be badlykept; indeed a child may die, or at the least may suffer severely because of the untidy habits and slovenly ways of the nurse. One of the easiest ways to discover what manner of woman she is, is this very question of the carpet. And should she object to one and suggest oilcloth, be quite sure she does not know her business, or only wants to save herself trouble. A carpet is a necessity in a properly-managed nursery, and that should be an axiom which should never for one instant be forgotten.
I should never paper the ceiling of a nursery, neither should gas be allowed there; neither should we overcrowd this room with furniture, nor should we permit a vast accumulation of toys. The ceiling should be washed cream-colour once a year, and the room, if small, should be lighted with a good duplex lamp from the centre of the ceiling; also from one swung out on an arm near the fireplace, if the room be large and the nurse wish to sit near the fire to do her work, or wash and undress the children there in winter. No lamps should be allowed to stand about anywhereand all must be out of the reach of the children, else will accidents certainly occur. The lamp must be re-trimmed and refilled daily downstairs by whoever attends to the sitting-room lamps, and must have a metal receiver. It must also be the reverse of cheap. Cheap lamps are dangerous and abominable in every way. Yet a lamp must we have in our nurseries if we wish the children to be well, and to escape the blighting influence of a gas-vitiated atmosphere. If no maid can be trusted to do the lamps the mistress must see to them herself. She need not take more than half an hour about the three or four which would be all that were used in a small house and she will reap the benefit in the children’s health, and in feeling confident that the lamps will not smell, and that they will burn brightly, and not expire suddenly because they have not been properly filled in the morning.
If the nursery is a small room I should advise the table to be made on the principle of one of the old oak gate tables in deal, stained a good dark brown. This is quite large enough to ‘dine’ four people, and can beused to cut out on, if required; and then when not in use it can be folded back and put against the wall, thus giving the child or children more room to play about. This table, a low chair or two, the children’s chairs, and about two or three rush-seated chairs are quite sufficient furniture for a nursery, if we add a big cupboard which, if we are lucky enough to have recesses each side of the fireplace, can easily be constructed by any working carpenter. If there are no recesses I should put this cupboard in one of the corners of the room; it would take up less space there, and would not cause as many accidents as if it stood out into the room, always ready to deal blows to the unsteady toddler for whose sake such danger must be steadily avoided. The lower part of the cupboard can be sacred to toys, the higher part to work and garments in course of construction. All clothes in wear should be placed in a cupboard in the dressing-room, which room should also contain the nursery cups and saucers and property generally, and all washing and dressing matters.
An excellent thing for the nursery is awide box-ottoman placed in the window, and if we can have one with sides and ends so much the better, as this can be turned with the back to the room, and here in a species of crib or cage, can a young person be placed safely to look out of the window, any attempts at falling over the back being frustrated by the nearness of the nurse. Of course baby cannot fall out of the window if open, or through it if shut, because of the most necessary nursery bars, which must be erectedinsidethe window, not outside in the ordinary way; in this position they do double duty, and not only prevent accidents, from the child falling out of the window, but render it almost impossible for the glass to be broken. Of course a nursery window should be of plate glass if no other window in the house is, and should have a cheerful outlook, an amusing outlook being better for a child than any amount of toys. The window should be absolutely draught-proof. It must have a ventilator capable of being almost hermetically sealed in its top pane, and at the same time very easily opened. It must never be stuffed upwith blinds and an undue amount of curtain. Sunshine means health, and the more sunshine a house or room receives the better. This should be impressed on a nurse at once, and she should never have the means of making the room dark and dismal in her hands, or else she will certainly do so at the very earliest possible opportunity.
Another most excellent thing to have in a nursery where there are growing children would be a regular hammock on good supports, to be erected or taken away at will, and to be sufficiently low to ensure that a fall therefrom would do no harm. This hammock would be as useful as a sofa, and as amusing as a swing, without the disagreeable after-effects and danger; and, of course, it should be heaped with the humble pillows, made of curled paper, in linen cases, which are so invaluable, because they cost nothing, and can be thrown about genially without doing any amount of damage at all.
The walls of the nursery must either be pictureless or embellished by really good autotypes, sufficient of which can be procured for about £5 for quite a large room. For let nothing allow anymother to put up the glaring vulgar nursery pictures which one sees so often in children’s rooms, and which undoubtedly vitiate the children’s tastes, and give them bad and false ideas of art from their earliest days. Then, too, I most thoroughly recommend that the amount of toys allowed be of the smallest: a Noah’s ark, a really good box of bricks, a horse and cart, dolls, and a nice doll’s house are quite sufficient for any small person. The child who is dependent on a constant supply of mechanical and expensive toys is a poor thing, and is never likely to grow up to be much good to itself or to anyone else.
If we arrange our nursery on these lines, and have the dressing-room also, we should require the simple bed for the nurse only to be brought into the room for use at night, and the dressing-room should be entirely kept for dressing purposes.
Our nursery needs a good cupboard. Wallace sells a good deal ‘linen cupboard,’ which, painted ‘real ivory,’ or electric turquoise enamel, makes a capital nursery wardrobe, and here the child’s clothes should be kept, while the nurse shouldhave one of Wallace’s indispensable corner wardrobes for her dresses, which costs by the way the ridiculous sum of 28s. All that is required besides is a combination piece of furniture with drawers—toilet-table and washing-stand combined—and which would give her ample space for all the linen she possesses. One of Shoolbred’s small bamboo cupboard-tables would hold boots and shoes and bonnets quite well, and no accumulations of any kind should be allowed. The nurse’s box must never be kept in either room, but be relegated at once to the box-room; and directly a child’s garment is outgrown, or the worse for wear, let it be given away. The only good I have ever been able to see in a small house is, that no one can possibly hoard there. If hoarding is begun it cannot be carried on, because if it were, there would speedily be no room to turn round.
Now, if one room only can be given up for a nursery, it must have fitments which can be removable at will in case we stay there not longer than the ordinary three years; or they can be on the lines of a ‘workers’ room,’ I designed for Messrs Wallace & Co., and whichsaid fitments are part and parcel of the chamber. In the first place the bed must fold up by day into a species of ‘combined bedstead and bookcase arrangement,’ which is a bed by night, and looks like a bookcase-sideboard by day; and in the second, another cupboard must be furnished with a shelf to draw out from above, resting on brackets: on which shelf are to stand the basin ewer, etc., when in use. The brushes and combs must be shut away, while the looking-glass should be an ornamental one over the mantelpiece.
With a room such as this the nurse must take the child to its mother when she herself is dressed, and she must throw up the window and open the door while she breakfasts with the other maid or maids. She must then ‘do’ her nursery thoroughly, and after that wash and dress the infant. While the child is quite small this should not be done later than 9 a.m; after it is a year old it must be dressed before breakfast, and go to its mother while the nurse has her meal. Indeed, no meals must be allowed in the nursery under these circumstances; and the fact of there being onlyone nurse means that the mother must act as upper nurse herself.
Such a situation I cannot recommend to any girl who has had but little acquaintance with the ways and manners of an infant. If she undertakes it, she will always be sending for a doctor; and, much as I love the profession, I would rather recommend the payment of a good nurse, for, if she is good, she knows far more about a baby than any doctor can do. He has most excellent theories, she a great amount of experience to aid her in wrestling with infantile complaints, which are generally treated far more satisfactorily by strict attention to diet, exercise and air, than by any amount of the newest and most wonderful drugs in the world.
If there are a couple of deep recesses, one each side of the fireplace, it would be quite possible to treat the room on the principles of the worker’s room and at no great expense. In one recess should be a folding bed, closed up in a cupboard during the day time, exactly on the same lines as the Harrow boys’ beds, and into this cupboard all the bedding can be shut. The second recess should have four or five shelvesfitted in, and these should be covered by doors in three divisions. The upper and lower doors should be shorter than the centre one, and they should all shut and open quite independently of each other. The top cupboard should be used for garments; the second one should enclose two shelves, the lower one of which should be double width and hinged half way, so that when in use, it could open out and be brought forward and be supported on folding brackets. This shelf must be painted with Aspinall’s bath enamel or else covered with white American leather to resist the action of water; and on this the washing apparatus must be arranged. Above, on the first shelf, all brushes and combs may be placed, while the glass over the mantelpiece can be used as a dressing-glass, or we can have one fixed inside the cupboard door that faces the light. On the other door should be fixed a brass rod for towels, then all would be complete. The cupboard under this shelf could be used on one side for the slop-pail, etc., and on the other for boots and shoes. These fitments could be made out of deal by any decent amateur carpenter. The wood couldeither be ‘goehring,’ which cannot warp or crack, or else well-seasoned deal, ‘primed for painting.’ It should receive a coat of Aspinall’s enamel, and after two days have elapsed and allowed that coat to harden thoroughly, a second should be applied. Paint is saved and a good decorative effect is obtained by filling in the panels with Japanese leather paper or else with anaglypta, while carved panels can be bought very cheaply in the material ‘goehring,’ which of course would require the same amount of paint as would the rest of the cupboard fitments. Then the window-seat can either be the box-ottoman one already suggested, sold by Story & Triggs for about £6, 6s., and called the ‘Desideratum,’ or it can be made at home from more deal or more ‘goehring.’ In this case the simplest way to proceed is to put a straight piece of wood right across the bow or Caldecott window, hiding it by a flounce of cretonne. The back of the window would form the back of the ottoman, while the bottom could be made of brown holland, tacked in on the inside all round. The hinges of the top should be fixed to the back of the window, and the sides shouldrest on wooden bars nailed on the sides of the window, and the top should be composed of a stout deal frame, supplemented by straps of webbing, and on these straps a cushion should be laid stuffed with flock. This box should be made very strongly indeed and need cost very little; but although it holds a great deal, and can be most useful to supplement the cupboards, it can never be half as serviceable as the real box-ottoman with the ends and sides of which I have already spoken.