The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1886-12-03
Ladies Department.
THE IDEAL HOME.
Suggestions That Will Add Beauty
and Taste to the Household.


lFrom BE ck's Journal of Decorative Ar:.l
The ideal home beautiful is attain
ed rather Ivy avoiding errors of taste
than ~ the adoption of special dog
mas of art. For my own part. if |
have any d,emas to preach, they
NAV fairly I've condensed in this one
rule: avoid shatns and Alterations
of all kinds"
Don't mistake mere prettiness for
beauty. Millinery, for instance. is
out OF place in the home beautiful.
Don't attach TO your chairs and
sofa, ushons meaningless bows Of
ribbon which tie nothing
Don't dress up your toilet-tables
in muslin (-tticoats, stitlened with
crinoline or colnred calico.
Don't scatter startling white "tid-
les" about chairs and sofas as on SO
many bushes, as if you were hanging
out til" wash to dry.
Don't display on your walls china
plates and dishes They were never
meant TO go there. An exception
NAV he made now and then, in favor
of piece Of fine color to light uu
the room or where q delicate China
painting is worthy of careful exam
ination, But hang up ordinary do.
nestle china! Don't.
Don't hang small pictures SO that
their beauty is lost to any one under
eight feet high. If a picture is not
seen from the same position that the
artist saw it when he painted it, the
drawing will appear foreshorten.
ed and the general effect consequent
]y falsi(ied.
Don't hang any picture in the
home which has not the Impress of
elegance, purity and cheerfulness.
Don't give place to representations
of corpses, tortured. And above all,
having such pictures and not want
ing them downstairs, don't Danish
them TO the nursery, school.room or
bedroom.
Some things I would relegate to
the bed room-out of the way some.
wherein locked drawers, for in
stance. I mean mementoes of sea-
weed and dried ferns or flowers, and
wretcled daubs on china, canvas or
paper. the crude efforts of youthful
members of the family. No true low
er of the home beautiful will intlict
these on his family and friends and
compel them to violate truth by pre-
tending to like them.
Don't buy your carpet or your
wall paper because it looks pretty in
the roll when You set in the store,
but think of the fitness Of each with
its ultimate surroundings. Remem-
Der that the carpet is to be u back
ground for your furniture, and the
wall opportunities it is to the actual
decoration of the walls-is to be
merely u background for your pict
ures.
Don't admit into the home beauti
full any piece Of furniture or imple-
ment of everyday life which does
not honestly serve its purpose-no
light fimsy chairs which an able
bodied man dare not sit upon; no
puffy debilitated sofas, all wind and
springs; no FURNISHED brass sheeted
fireirons. bought only to be looked
at, and give place to the ugly little
black poker and shovel when coal is
to be broken or ashes are to be re-
moved.
There is no reason why an object
should not be useful as we'll as orna.
mental. Indeed there can be no
beauty without fitness. Nature ev.
erywhere teaches us the compatible
ity of the highest utility with the
greater beauty.
And so beauty and truth. There
may be truth without beauty, but
there is no beauty without truth.
Truth, beauty and utility are the in
separable trinity of the ideal home.
Let us then write them upon the
portals of the house as the epitome
of all that is most admirable in re-
ligion, in art, and every.day.life.
-s|0I<-