Whatever curtains are used, they should be hung with rings from rods of brass, bamboo, or wood—varnished pine is good enough—so that they can be pushed entirely to one side with ease. Rods should not be too large and should be finished at the ends with some simple ornament, as a plain ball which pulls off at one end, so as to allow the rings to slip over the rod. The curtains may be long, if hung outside the window frame, and just reach the floor, or they may hang from the upper sash and just reach to the window ledge, so as to cover only the window; or they may be half curtains hanging from a small rod or wire so as to screen only the lower sash. It is not at all necessary to treat the windows alike. A bay window may have a long, heavy curtain running across the bay and forming a nook where two or three may sit cosily together, and the other windows may be treated to sash or half-sash curtains of soft silk, Madras muslin, or even Turkey red calico. Where a window is filled with plants, the little half curtain running upon a brass wire and falling over the lower sash serves, on winter nights, as a slight protection for the plants from outer air, and can be thrust to one side by day, and tucked up out of sight. A little drapery is a great relief in a room where there are bare floors and much display of woodwork in doors and window frames. Then, a portière in place of a closet door, a hanging before a book case, or curtains at the windows would relieve the bareness of the room as nothing else could. Curtains should not repeat the color of the walls, nor should portières be of the same material and color as the curtains. Woodwork, however, when painted should repeat the wall color, though it should be somewhat lighter in shade.
There lacks but little to make our home parlor complete. A piano, if practice thereon will not interfere with the occupancy of the room by the household; otherwise let the piano be kept where music lessons given and studied will not disturb the family serenity; for many reasons the drawing room is the best place for the piano, it is more likely to be treated with respect by mischievous fingers there than in the living room; and a clock, the plainer the better—no little French fanciful affair, but something substantial, that can last like the tall, ancestral eight-day time piece. Should the clock stand on the mantel it is not essential to have balancing ornaments on either side. The choicest treasures of the house should indeed adorn the mantel piece, but it is never necessary to have two of a kind standing at equal distances from the center.
This is the room in which all things should seem to grow into a likeness to the household, and to grow old with it. Here no changes should be made but for good cause, and always for the better, never by the wholesale. Nor should furniture be introduced that is so staringly new and gay as to put the rest out of countenance and make it look shabby by comparison. There are plenty of good stuffs subdued enough in color to harmonize with any long used parlor, no matter how old the carpet nor how faded the chair seats. Whatever is good and old, though worn, let us respect, preserve, and repair.
NATIONAL AID TO EDUCATION.
BY GENERAL JOHN A. LOGAN,
U. S. Senator from Illinois.
To bring to light and expose to public gaze our national defects or social deformities is an unpleasant and generally thankless task, but so long as we shirk it, just so long will they remain to our national detriment and disgrace. To be conscious of disease, to locate and properly diagnose it, is to be half-way on the road to good health.