The tradesman difficulty is the first misery, and then come the miseries of making acquaintance really with our house and surroundings. We are sure to discover a thousand small vexatious omissions in the house itself, and above all—‘miserere mei!’—will we see with dismay that the furniture which looked quite beautiful in our old home has suddenly, and in the most unprovoked manner, become absolutely shabby and miserable.
This is an unanswerable problem, but it is a fact, and I can only account for it by suggesting that the new paper and paint are to blame, and that the sooner we get our furniture done up and rejuvenated the sooner shall we become reconciled to our new house; but, of course, this costs money—at a time, too, when money has been flowing away a little too freely to be pleasant—and, no doubt, we may have to wait: another reason why a move is trying, and why, like marriage, it should never be undertaken lightly or unadvisedly; and at first we must make the best of our surroundings, being duly thankful for the square carpets and the light short curtains that save us so much piecing and planning, and looking forward to new cretonne and tapestry as soon as we can afford it.
Then comes the misery of making new friends; and here I would say a word of warning to those who go to an entirely unknown place, and have absolutely no introductions. The best and nicest folk do not rush to call on new people unless they have some knowledge of them; therefore wait a little and ‘gang warily’ before accepting as your fidus Achates the first lady who enters your doors, for doubtless her call is caused by curiosity, and because she has but few acquaintances and wishes ardently to have more.
Of course, if you have an immense house and heaps of money, everyone calls on the house and on your income, and you can soon discriminate for yourselves who is likely to be desirable and who is not; but the ordinary householder should be very cautious about the acquaintances she makes until she feels her feet, and can find out somehow—it is from the clergyman and his wife generally—who is who, taking care in her turn to tell enough of herself and her forbears to show that she is respectable at any rate, and obtaining in due course the same sort of information about those with whom she is surrounded.
In London—dear, lovely, unsnobbish London—one can do absolutely as one likes about everything, and nowhere is society as good as it is there. In the country the very best society is dull. In London one can meet with the only society worth having, in my opinion: the society of those who either in art, literature, science, or politics have ‘done something,’ and are making the history of the world. From this country folk are absolutely debarred: another reason, dear readers, why I say live in London, if you can in any way contrive to do so, and do not leave it on any pretext whatever. But as man must associate with his kind or perish, no doubt there are compensating elements in country society that are evident to those who have lived among it all their lives. At any rate, we can live more unselfishly in the country, and do more good to those of our poorer brethren than we can in these crowded streets, where they are nothing to us save a probable source of infection, and a certain source of annoyance and dread.
To sum up this chapter briefly, then: let no move be made, unless such a course is absolutely imperative; let it be done in order and with regularity; and make no rushes into friendship in your new neighbourhood until you have discovered who is who, and made due inquiries on this subject; and, above all, under all circumstances, if fate has absolutely obliged you to make that particular move, make the best of it, and don’t always either mentally or openly contrast your present abode unfavourably and bad-temperedly with your last location. You have to live where you have pitched your tent: therefore, bad as the place may appear to you, try and smother your feelings until use has made you reconciled to your new surroundings, even if ‘home’ has not asserted its charm and caused you to become fond of the place, because your best and dearest are there with you. It will be an effort, I can assure you, to do so, but if you are strong-minded enough to suffer in silence, you will be repaid for so doing a thousand-fold.
CHAPTER II.
HALLS AND PASSAGES.
The first part of the new house that should be attacked by the decorator’s art is undoubtedly the hall: and as undoubtedly it is here that the ordinary speculative builder surpasses himself; for, as a rule, the moment one opens the front door one falls up the staircase, or else one is confronted by a long, hopeless passage, which strikes a chill into the stoutest heart, especially if the owner of that heart has not had much experience in the art of ‘how to make the best’ of a very bad state of affairs.
But in these days of ours nothing in the way of amelioration is impossible; and, indeed, were I given carte blanche I would undertake to make the most hideous, square, ‘impossible’ house a bower of beauty. That sounds very egotistical, but I really do not mean it to be so; I only should like to impress upon my readers that never before has so much attention been given to decoration of houses as is given now, and that by the aid of carefully planned woodwork and by using arches on the plan of the Moorish fretwork first introduced by Liberty, a square room can be made picturesque, and a long narrow passage pleasant to contemplate, by simply putting up a series of slight arches, or else by curtaining off portions of it by aid of simple wooden partitions, such as are illustrated on page 25. I am very proud indeed of this sketch, as it was made from a brilliant inspiration of mine for a house where the instant one opened the door leading into the street, one was confronted by the stairs on one hand, and a long uninteresting straight passage on the other; and I was indeed pleased when I suddenly saw that a couple of arches could be cut out from what might have been a partition placed along the foot of the stairs from one side of the hall to the other, and that the arch at the stair foot could be curtained by a double curtain or pair of curtains, which would fall together when anyone raised it to go upstairs; while the other arch could be draped either to the left or right with a heavy piece of material according to the position of the wall, or whether there is anything in the way of a cupboard or door to be concealed.