The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-08-24

 between frame, or frame building can be boarded and furred and lathed with wood, or, better, with iron frame plas- tered. In all cases we have a fire-re- sisting surface.
 The old method long ago used in parts of England especially in Kent, where lime abOunds, is a good one; merely concrete poured between tenn porary wooden moulds or frames. The outside surface in Kent and Norfolk is often finished with split Hints im- bedded in the concrete and forming a perfectly smooth and non-porous sur face. have seen walls in and about Norwich where the split fiints have been squared before setting, and so nicely was this done that the joints be- tween the stones were almost imper- ceptible. A concrdte wall is, however, lection with paint or some sush non- porus material, while the stud wall plastered needs no paint and Is as per- manent as the wood frame. Such a wall would not cost over two to three dollars a square more than boarded and shingled building; in fact, in many parts of the country would cost no more. On the basis of two to three dollars square more, to the three thousand dollar house, it would add only fifty or seventy-five dollars; and this cement surface requires no paint and, if Of good material and well ap- piled originally, no repairing. The fin- ish of such a building can be no metal, wood hn so as to offer to the fire no more than the wood frames and staff beads of g. brick building.
 In the eighth report of the commits sioner of labor compiled by Dr. Gould in 1885, there are some very interesting statements of the cost of tenements and small houses, which, although re- ferring to a simpler class than the ma- jority of those one has in mind here, are yet most pertinent. In examining them one is at once Struck by two points-frst, they are all substantially built of brick or stone, and, second, they have about them a fair amount of land, and this land is used intelligent ly as capital which will produce in- come.
 The Mulhouse Working Mems Dwell- ing company has erected a large num- Der of cottages of differing types, but all have the points noted above. They vary slightly in arrangement, accom- modation and cost. One type is a group of four three-storied cottages placed back to back in the center of a three-acre lot. Each house has it's | three-quarters of an acre. and light and air on two sides. This type has four rooms, with a total area of seven hundred square feet, three hundred and fifty on each floor, and a cellar and attic as well. It cost four hundred and fifty dollars for the building and thirty | dollars for the land, and rents for thir- ty-six dollars year. A variation of this type has larger ground area, but only one floor.
 Examples could be multiplied indefi- nitely; and they would all tend to show that the best type of foreign house is substantial and set in grounds that are | of real value to the tenant or owner Besides this, the most complete priva- cy of the family in house and in garder is generally attained. Such houses art fairly safe from fire, and if, perchance they should burn, would not seriously
 endanger any but their immediate neighbors. They are good investments good houses, On a slightly better I scale, and for higher class of owners
 they might readily be made beautiful
 as well, and the piece of land if no l needed for the kitchen garden, may bt
 lovely with shrubs, trees, flowers
 hedges and paths. One cannot but be
 lieve that if such homes were availa
 ble, they would be readily appreciated -Clipston Sturgis in the New England
 Magazine