From Kitchen to Garret: Hints for young householders

by J. E. Panton

Edwin’s desk should be wide and strong, and should have good deep drawers. This can be bought ready made for about 12l., but I can provide a similarly convenient article for 2l. 15s.; that is to say, I can provide Edwin with ideas on the subject that any small carpenter can carry out. I have had for years a writing-table made by our own carpenter which cost me 2l. 5s., and is now doing honourable service as a dressing-table in a boy’s room. It was made simply in deal, had three very deep drawers on each side, and one flat long drawer at the top; and the top was covered neatly with a piece of Japanese leather paper, which was quite as serviceable as good leather. I then had it nicely painted to match the room, added brass handles and locks, and had an extremely pretty desk or dressing-table for very little money. It is now painted a very beautiful blue, Aspinall’s hedge-sparrow’s-egg blue, and is most useful; deep drawers in a desk or dressing-table meaning comfort, for there is nothing more uncomfortable than having nowhere to put one’s things. Good inkstands—indeed, the best I know is the deep blue-and-white china one to be bought at the Baker Street Bazaar for sixpence—should never be forgotten. Two should be bought, one for red and one for black (there is no ink, by the way, like Stephens’ blue-black fluid; I cannot write without it, and always take it with me wherever I go); a box for string, filled, a post-card case, a letter-weigher, and a date-card and candlestick, and also a tray for sealing-wax, pens, ink-eraser, &c., all should find places on the desk, and above it, or on one side, should hang something to hold letters—a basket at 4½d. does beautifully; beneath it should be a wastepaper basket, and if Angelina be wise she will have a sack in a cupboard from some paper works, into which all pieces of wastepaper should be put. The sack soon fills, and from disposing of the contents there are seven shillings, which come in handily for plants, or flowers, or any of the many trifles that seem nothing to buy, but that run away somehow with so very much money—trifles making up life after all. If possible, keep a bunch of flowers on the desk. I am never without one winter or summer, and there is ample room on the desk I describe for this and also for dictionaries, two plants, and three brass pigs taking a walk, which I always use as a letter-weight.

The dining-room desk should always be looked after by the mistress herself, who should also take care that fresh ink, pens that will write, a blotting-book, and wastepaper basket are in every room in the house that is used, including the spare bedroom. Seeing to this often saves a good deal of time and temper too; for I know of nothing more irritating than to have to write a note in a hurry and have nothing handy to do it with.

The dining-room, or, indeed, any room, would not be complete without a few words on the subject of the mantelpiece, which is always rather a difficult matter to arrange; for one must have a clock there, and that means expense, unless we are content with a very charming specimen Oetzmann, of the Hampstead Road, used to sell for 25s. I have had one three, nay, four, years in my drawing-room, and it still goes excellently. It is blue, and in a tall slender black case. It is called the Chippendale clock. I dare say he keeps them still. Then there should be candles in blue and white china candlesticks, and any pretty ornaments Angelina may have, and, if none are given her, why, 1l. judiciously laid out at Liberty’s or the Baker Street Bazaar will furnish more than one mantelshelf delightfully. I could make my readers smile over my hunt sixteen years ago for some nice candlesticks if I had the time, and could contrast my difficulties then with the embarras de richesse now. But space does not allow of these digressions. Still, whatever else is done without, let us be sure to have a couple of well-filled spillcases, and a matchbox with matches in it fixed to the wall; though, if we have the ordinary marble incubus of the orthodox suburban residence to deal with, we shall have to think over the mantelpiece question most seriously, for this is indeed a burning question, and one that would daunt the stoutest heart to answer satisfactorily, and I look forward hopefully to a time when builders will eschew the expensive and ugly marble in favour of wooden mantelpieces, which are, to my mind, all they ought to be.

In the first place, a wooden mantelpiece continues, as it were, the scheme of decoration of the room, and, without being unduly prominent, makes the necessary unobtrusive frame for the fireplace that a staring white marble erection can never be. And, in the second, any stain from smoke can be washed off the painted mantelpiece, while a few days’ carelessness, a smoky chimney, or a housemaid’s unclean paws can ruin a marble mantelpiece beyond the hope of redemption; therefore on all accounts I think a wooden one is to be preferred.

Of course, some people, even in a small house, regard the possession of the marble in the light of a patent of nobility—it is so handsome (odious word), so genteel; but these belong to the hopeless class, for whom little or nothing can be done. As an illustration of what I mean, I may tell you I once was asked by one of these individuals to come down to her country house and give my opinion on the subject of some wall-papers she was hesitating between; and when I entered her drawing-room, where my lady was not, but was heard scouring about upstairs, hastily changing her dress to be fit to be seen at four o’clock in the afternoon, I saw just such a gorgeous marble erection, and, in a species of compromise between the taste of the day and the sense of proud possession given by the marble, there was a valance hung round the edge of the shelf, supported, or rather tied on, with tapes, so that the fact of the material of which the shelf was made was visible to the eye of the visitor. I could not take my eyes off it, and on learning that my opinion was asked in reference to the room in which I was, I asked about the valance, suggesting how ridiculous it looked suspended, poor thing, in mid-air, and hinting that a board would give it a reason for its existence; but this was received with so much surprise that I could not recognise how beautiful the marble was, that I got out of the room as soon as I could, knowing that here any advice I could give would be utterly thrown away. In a great house where gorgeousness, not prettiness, reigns, marble is, of course, more in place than it is with us, but I do not like it at all in our cold native land, where our grey skies and dark atmosphere cry out for colour, and I would relegate it to Italy, where it contrasts charmingly with the ardent skies and glowing air inseparable from that land of sun and flowers. I do hope some builder, who is intent on building houses for the Edwins and Angelinas of the day, may read my humble words, and, turning his back on the marble, may put up in the pretty residences that are now the rule and not the exception the simple wooden mantelpiece that lends itself so kindly to decoration, and does not assert itself like the ‘handsomer’ one does in a small house—in a manner that resembles a rich relation come to call, and reduce the poor connection to a sense of his position and utter lowliness.

The mantelpiece of wood can have one or two little shelves in the comers under the shelf itself; here can be placed cups or vases for flowers. Then comes the shelf itself, and finally the over-mantel. In one of my rooms where the slate mantelpiece is hopeless, I have covered the top with a plain board, painted turquoise blue, the colour of the room. This is edged by a goffered frill of cretonne, like the curtains, about a foot deep. It is nailed on the front of the board, and the nails hidden by a moulding, also painted blue. Over this I have a glass about two feet wide with a bevelled edge, and framed in plain deal, painted blue, and surmounted by a shelf about four inches wide, supported by two small blue brackets. Of course the frame of the fireplace ought to be blue too, and it is a sore subject, I can tell you, that it is not; but being of black slate it is not so trying as it might be—not so trying, for example, as another room would have been had I not boldly painted its odious yellow and white marble mantelpiece black, to match my paint, and so removed an eyesore that looked like nothing so much as poached eggs very badly cooked and sent to table. I did go through the farce of asking my good and indulgent landlord, who, fortunately for me, was artistic, and gave his consent freely; but I am afraid, even if he had not, I should have painted it quite as boldly, and trusted to ‘luck’ to have escaped any fearful penalty when my lease was up, and I left my decorations behind me for some one else—decorations that include another painted mantelpiece, this time a dull grey stone thing, that is quite lovely in a terra-cotta coat of paint, and its top covered, as I have just described the blue covering, with a terra-cotta painted board, and a frill of blue and white Mysore chintz.

I am always being reminded of how much a fireplace is in a room by going into quite charming chambers where nothing is wanting save and excepting a nice arrangement there. The whole room is spoiled, and the ugliness there contrasts so forcibly with the rest of the room that I can never avoid mentioning it, and begging the owner to call at Shuffery’s, in Welbeck Street, whose cheap wooden mantelpieces and tiled hearths cannot possibly be too widely known, and are cheaper than those of any other firm: though, of course, a clever draughtsman can make his own designs, and a wooden mantelpiece could be made by an ordinary carpenter, but the ‘stuff’ must be well seasoned and carefully put up, so us to have no risk of fire.

Always, if possible, have a tiled hearth and a very simple fender. A gorgeous fender is a mistake; if a tiled hearth is provided all one requires is a black frame to enclose the hearth, with two brass knobs just to brighten it up; then get some brass fire-irons and two standards at Maple’s or else at Hampton’s, where brass things are very good and cheap, and, if in any way obtainable, see your grates are Barnard’s. They save their cost in coal in a very short time, and are very pretty and simple. I have one that cost a little over 4l.; it has a simple black frame, enclosing some pretty blue and white tiles, and has firebrick sides and bottom, and is as low as the hearthstone. The fire in this grate keeps alight from about 11 A.M. until 2 P.M. in the coldest winter weather, and I have never once during that time to ring for coals. Another ordinary stove during the same hours has to be continually watched and replenished, and while the blue and white room is always hot, the other room, possessed of the all-devouring grate, is never even warm, and sometimes one end thereof is hardly above freezing point. I have an equally good grate in the drawing-room, and here a fire made up at eight burns steadily until eleven at night, and often is quite a gorgeous fire at bedtime. I believe these grates are made at Norwich, but Shuffery sends them or similar grates equally satisfactory with his wooden mantelpieces; which, by the way, are supplied with Doulton ware fenders like the tiled hearths. These save needless trouble to the servants, as they only require dusting and an occasional wash-over to be always clean.

While we are on the subject of fires, I can tell my readers of a comfortable manner to keep in a fire in a bedroom or drawing-room, when a fire is wanted, but not a ‘regular blazer.’ To insure there being a fire, line the bottom and front of the grate with a newspaper, then fill it up, nearly to the top of the fireplace, with quite small coal, on the top of this lay an ordinary fire, with nice lumps of bright coal, wood, &c., and set light to it; this fire will burn downwards steadily, and can be left to take care of itself; and then, when the room is required for use, all that is wanted is a judicious poke, and a pretty cheerful blaze rewards you, while you have the satisfaction of knowing your fire is in, and no waste of fuel to any appreciable extent is going on, should the room not be in occupation.