San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1892-05-30
DRAFTY ENGLISH HOUSES.


ern Comforts or Conveniences.
The average dwelling house in any
class-upper. middle or lower-buili
within year.is constructed almost pre-
cisely on the lines in vogue at the begin
ming of the century. In England there
has been in ninety years no such ad-
Vance in domestic architecture, with re.
gard to both convenience and style. as
we have noted in the United States in
the last decade. The Englishman may
explain this by alleging that he built
better in 1900 than we did in 1882 In
this he will not be altogether wrong,
but he will be supported by fewer facts
than he imagines.
The British carpenter has not yet mas
tered the art of making a window
There is always gale blowing in around
the sashes during the winter. whether
the outside air be calm or raging. The
more heat you get in roonl-and by
lamps and gas You can contrive to raise
the temperature-the greater is the rush
of cold air from without. 1t forces its
way around the window sashes and the
doors in obedience to a natural law.
An English house is drafty, whether
it be the dwelling of a peer or peasant.
The doors are hung even worse than the
windows. In the first place there are no
thresholds, and there is a gaping space
between the floor and the bottom of the
door. The room in which | am now
writing has an admirable specimen of an
English door. | have just measured the
yawning crevices around it. Between
the floor and the bottom of the door
there is space One-half an inch wide
extending across the entire breadth of
the door. Around the other three sides
OF the door there is space one-quarter
of an inch wide. All the doors in the
place (Which is not the work of Jerry
builder" but is what the British call "a
high class" and expensive structure) are
n IN the same sd fash 'on' Imagine
snen, the number of portieres ana 'hich
rugs necessary to exclude the drafts.
The halls of an English house are I'M
heated. Drafts are accordingly increas-
ed, for the cold air will always rush
from the chilly halls into the apart
ments of high temperature. Screens.
portieres, rugs, heavy window hangings
are essential in every room. Of course
these things darken an apartment. Thus
you can only break the currents of air
in a London dwelling by adding to the
depressing gloom of the almost sunless
London winter.
An American housekeeper setting up
an establishment here misses the nu-
merous and capacious closets of the
Yankee domicile. Closet making is an
unknown art to the Nineteenth century
British builder. | know of any number
of new and expensive dwellings-both
fats End hoasss-i. which there is -. :. +,
hanging closet. The most you can do is
to provide a few cupboards in the
"chififey joys" For clothing you must
have wardrobes set up in your rooms,
monopolizing space and being as cheer
full to gaze upon as sarcophagi. Odds
and ends you must stow away as best
you can. Cellars, in the American sense,
are unheard Of. A small dungeon for
Goals or a penitential cell for wines full
fills the British housekeeper's notion of
a cellar. "Set tubs" are usually reserved
for the mansions of the great"
The bathroom is the latest innova-
ton in English houses of the better
class, but it is still an innovation. The
clumsy tin tub, a yard and a half in
width and six inches in depth, continues
to be the Btiton's favorite instrument
for the matutinal ablution. In this I'M
wieldy contrivance, brought into his
chamber in the morning, John Bull
takes his frigid splash. His aversion to
bathrooms is akin to his horror of gas
''above the drawing room" j. B. pre-
fers to go to bed by candle light He
has notion that gas will suffocate him
in his sleep. Perhaps he cannot trust
himself to shut off the illuminant by
turning the tap."-London Cor. Boston
Herald.