The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1882-09-30
0urs@lio.
From Harper's Magazine for September.
HOW TO FURNISH A HOME.
A FEW PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS

! ing In the business of housekeeping, write
to editors asking how to furnish home.
Strange as it may seem, they never apply
to lawyers, physicians, blacksmiths, or rail-
road presidents for such information. 1t
may not be generally known that one of
the first duties of an editor is to acquire
thorough knowledge of the art of house
furnishing There are strong grounds for
the belief that the failure of the graduates
of the Yale School of Journalism to OBTAIN
remunerative editorial positions on our
leading journals is owing principally to the
fact that the studies of the class did not
include the important science of house-fur-
nishing.
Editors, however, when gratuitOusly i'm
parting instruction on this subject, are
prone to manifest too much extravaganza
in their ideas, evidently presuming that the
parties who desire the information are roll
ing in quite as much affiuence as themselves.
The suggestions herewith appended are plain
and practical, and designed to fit salary of
not over fifteen hundred dollars year.
In furnishing home, respective madam,
the first and most important requisite Is to
get the home Should this suggestion be
ignored, it will be almost impossible to act
upon those which follow with any appreci-
able degree of success. Having procured
the home, the next step is to improve Its
appearance and give it an air of comfort
The floors should be covered with mate
rial called carpet, manufactured expressly
for this purpose 1t is desirable to have a
few chairs in each room. These will be
found very convenient to stand upon when
driving picture-nails in the walls or mash
ing mosquitoes on the ceiling. Also for
the women-folk to hastily mount when a
frightful monster in the shape of mouse
invades the room.
A desideratum is a wooden contrivance
in the dining-room denominated table.
A dining-room is very incomplete without
this piece of furniture Its usefulness will
become apparent at the dinner hour. Upon
this table are placed dishes and eatables,
and by drawing up and sitting upon the
chairs before mentioned, the family are en-
abled to partake of the viands before them
with amazing ease and airy freedom 10
reeline upon the floor when satisfying the
demands of hunger is hagrant violation
of the rules of etiquette outside OF Chl-
nese dwelling or an Indian wigwam-
In the absence of heater in the base
ment, an iron implement technically termed
stove will prove very enjoyable during
the late fall, winter, and early spring months.
By building fire in the stove the temper
ature of room may be maintained above
sixty degrees throug ghout the eoldest wealth
er the Manitoba wave market affords.
Some writer's on home adornment advise
against having stoves in the house, on the
ground that they provoke strife between
man and wife, both of whom, it Is alleged,
insist upon getting up first in the morning
to build the fires; but dutiful and loving
husband will always gracefully submit to
the better judgment of his wife in such
controversy.
The front windows may be provided with
blinds or shades. These not only shut out
the sunlight, which fades the carpets, but
serve admirably to exclude the prying eyes
of the neighbors across the way. Don't
hang too many cheap chromos on the walls
1t is better to have one really good picture
by Me;ssonier or Bouguereau, or some 9TH
er foreigner who charges SIC, ,0O6 for nine
by twelve canvas, than to own seventeen
"oil-paintings with rich gold frames cost
ing three dollars and fifty cents apiece.
If your grandmother's gift on your wed
ding day was one of her mothers old blue
china tea-pots with cracked waist and a
fractured spout, don't outrage all the canons
of the Beautiful in Art by utilizing it on
the tea-table. 1t should have prominent
place on an ebony cabinet In the parlor.
Your aesthetic friends will call it a ''sweet
piece of bric-a-brac," though sensible per
sons may call it by its right name-'old
trash" sensible persons, however, are
glaring failures as aesthetics, and their re-
marks should be treated as the idle wind.
A bedstead in each sleeping g-chamber is
regarded by many persons as indispensable.
When spring mattress is placed upon a
bedstead, its adaptability for sleeping pur-
pose is immensely enhanced. Even not
over-particular man takes advantage OF the
repose and solace afforded by such bed
when he comes home at midnight sober.
The bedroom should also be furnished with
bureau and two or three chairs. 1t Is
customary, before retiring at night, to gar
nish the back of one of the chairs with
sixteen dollars worth of store hair, and tC
pile enough wearing apparel on the others
to bury them out of sight. The bureau
generally contains four receptacles called
drawers. and if the number was forty-seyen
they would all be crammed so full of one
thing and another that it would be utterly
impossible for an ordinary man to open and
shut them without indulging in language
never found in books of a religious charac
ter. After thirty-four unsuccessful efforts
to close drawer so that shirt sleeve or {
rufied something viii not be left hanging
, outside, as if intended as sample OF the
! goods within, he gives it vicious shove
and lets 90 at that.
Whether your boudoir is provided with
a mirror or not is simply matter of taste
', Mirrors are tolerated in good society, bu
of course they are for ornament and no
for use.
The mantel-piece is feature of the par
lor that viii permit of the display of mic
, taste in Its adornment Besides afordins
a very convenient rest for tie husband
, feet when he is sitting on his spine in al
! easy-ehair, smoking cigar and reading tn
dali paper, it also invites him to deposit
, cigar stub behind vase, where his wit
!. finds it and makes a few energetic remark
! on the evils of smoking.
You might worry along without pian
. and still retain the respect of your next
! door neighbors But if you possess no NOR
talent for music than fife and drum corp:
i you viii decide to have piano; and In pun
chasing the instrument don't select one IN
dorsed by celebrated prima donna as 9Th
; best" Such piano is too numerous, an
, to own it would necessitate large outia
r of money. 1t would also monopOlize to
: much space In each room in the house.