The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1897-04-15
ideas for dMn1nen.


covering, 1t can be restored to use and a
good appearance by some one about the
house who is handy with scissors and
hammer.
Get from the uphoisterer's enough
tapestry cloth for your purpose with a
paper of tacks. the tiny ones the furni-
ture repairers use. n a few yards of
gimp. Remove the upper covering of the
chair or sofa, dust, and with a bit of
soapy water clean the woodwork thor
Iughly. Spread the goods over the seat,
hcking across the front, pull it closely
nd tack across the back.
Next cut off all superiiuous goods and
EfFack along the sides. pulling all wrinkles
f4perfectly smooth. Put tacks very close,
as thes are quite short and have not
much. hold. Trim again very close to the
tracks and put on the gimp, using gimp
tacks for the purpose. With a little kero-
sene oil and linseed oil mixed, go over the
woodwork, if there is any, rubbing IN the
oil and polishing it off with clean flannel
until the article shows a very high gloss.
In attempting to cover an article Of fur
niture never remove the old cover and
make the mistake of cutting the new one
out of 1t. Use the whole piece. lacking it
in place and cutting off after the thing
has been covered. A quaint old spindle
legged suite of furniture that had done
duty many years, being moved from the
front drawing-room to the family sitting
room and to the children's room, and fin
ally to the attic, was withdrawn and re-
furnished, it's quaint, slender legs polish
cd and new covering tackled on and REIN
stated to a quaint little room, the private
den" of the daughter of the house.
The material used for recovering was
old rose and dull green's. with al elusive
thread of gold running through the en-
tire pattern. The material was bought
by the yard at 81 per yard; it was very
wide and took only four yards to cover
four chairs and a long, narrow sofa.
Handsome gimp and cord of old rok and
gold finished the edges. If a screen is
desired a pretty one can be made with
little outlay.
Get the carpenter to make a frame in
three parts as high as desired, only lave
the centre panel higher than the two side
ones. Cover all three neatly with white
duck, tapping and lacking the material
Y elOu6 t1S CuSS VI Tie PdlSi. Use fCly
small tacks and put them in close.
Get a good quality of white lead and
a quart of turpentine and thin the lead
to the consistency of thick cream. Fill
the duck covering of the screen with as
much of this mixture as it will take.
letting it dry and applying again and
again until the duck is quite hard. Let
it dry thoroughly and with a clean brush
apply a thick coat of white enamel paint.
When this has quite dried the screen
is ready for finishing. Upon one side
paint tiny garlands of pink roses, en-
tirely around the panel at the edge, inter
secting the garland with bow knots of
ribbon with futtering ends.
In the centre of each panel, a little
toward the lower edge, put in with a few
broad touches and crude colors a tiny
pastoral scene.
On the reverse side scatter tiny rose
buds and caves singly all over. join the
panels with little brass hinges and the
result VIII be a very pretty, dainty ar
ticle of house decoration, looking many
times Its value. A touch of gold put On
judiciously improves the appearance.
<s
Uniforms being unquestionably a good
1g where the precision or resemblance
of a number of persons is the object, can
hardly be an argument to prove that you
or / should go out .alone bedecked in
braid and uniform for a ride of pleasure,
says "Harper's Round Table" And the
mere desire to be uniform with others in
a CORPS cannot be the real reason, be-
cause the uniform might be of some
rough dust-colored Scotch cloth, which is
cheaper, lasts longer, looks better, and in
several other ways suggests a trace of
good taste. The real reason for these
strange ideas of costumes in bicycling Is
really bad taste. A boy or man wants
something to ride in, and while it would
never occur to him to go out in a thun-
der storm without an umbrella, it seldom
enters his head to think over what would
really be most suitable for his costume.
A wheelman should wish to look well
when riding, and looking well means
hooking clean, well kept, not conspicu-
GUS. Quiet clothe are the first thing;
stockings that have some trace of ar
idea of matching the cloth; a cap that
goes with the other things-not all alike.
by any means, nothing could be worse;
but sufficiently different in pattern to
avoid monotony, and sufficiently anke in
color to avoid a general upheaval of
e~verybody's sense<of good taste.
The color ought always to be or the
shades of brown and yellow or gray.
anything that will show dust-the one dis
colorer of all bicycle things-as little as
possible. The shoes, if black, are abso-
lutely certain, after three minutes of a
country road, to look about as unkempt
as anything can well look. Tan shoes
evidently are much better. Mud and
dust show less pom them. Then comes
the question of pins. You will see a man
tearing along with a big jewelled pin on
his coat, representing a wheel or some
other part of a bicycle, or perhaps a
winged foot. What has that to do with
the enjoyment of a rider It is merely
some ones irrepressibIe desire to show
that he-even he-belongs to something,
ard if he only knew how absurd he ap-
peared, there can be little doubt what
would become of the pin-while he was
bicycling at least. If, therefore, you
must wear pins, avoid jewels in any case
and invariably wear the pin inside you1
coat or on your waistband, or, better
still, pin it carefully on the inside lining
of the inside pocket. Good taste and
good judgment In bicycle clothes seem t.
be very rare, and yet they are not diff
cult qualities to cultivate. They simply