Do not look upon the taste and beauty of details as unimportant. They make up the harmony of our lives. Taste exercises a larger influence than we give it credit for. What makes Paris flourish? Why do we all enjoy it? Not for its Louvre galleries, nor for its intellectual life and culture most, but for its tasty shops!
We will speak of the house in the following order. First, the hall by which we enter it from the street; then we will bring our housewife into the kitchen, not necessarily, nor even advisably, downstairs, but near the entrance-door, so that the goods brought into the house need not have far to travel and be lifted (which would entail fatigue) before they reach the scene of their transmutation; the dining-room will come naturally next to the kitchen, as it should be nearest in a topographical sense.
Then we can adjourn to the withdrawing-room, and refresh ourselves with jardinière or conservatory before undertaking the arrangement of the bed-rooms and nurseries, where we pass so large a portion of our lives; and lastly, we will speak of the inhabitants, more particularly of the children. In considering the latter, we shall find the greatest benefit of anything I have recommended in this book, namely, that in place of the low-minded words and sentiments and vulgar habits of those who come nearest to ourselves in the society of our children, we may have a higher and purer association, so that the good of their future education will not have already been neutralized by corrupted early principles.
By interesting occupation our young ladies will have less time for sentimental troubles and fancied ill-health, which is nervousness. Eugénie de Guérin hit the mark when she wrote, "Yes; work, work! Keep busy the body, which does mischief to the soul! I have been so little occupied to-day, and that is bad for one, and it gives a certain ennui which I have in me time to ferment." On another occasion she speaks of having been writing and thinking, and then going back to her spinning-wheel or a book, or taking a saucepan, or playing with her dogs; and then she adds, "Such a life as this I call heaven upon earth."
[ [1] ] The tricolour salad imitates the Italian banner—red, white, and green. Green salad, beetroot, and cream, or white of egg whipped to snow.
THE ENTRANCE-HALL.
The evil of side doors — Difficulties with cooks — Who is to answer the door? — Four classes of applicants — Arrangements for trades-people — Visitors — Furniture of the hall — Warming the passages — Dirt and door-mats — The door-step — Charwomen.