Shakspeare's bequest to his wife of his second-best bed has passed as a bit of post-mortem ungallantry, which has dimmed his fame as a model husband; but to-day that second-best bed would be a very handsome bequest, not only because it was Shakspeare's, but because it was doubtless a "tester," for which there is a craze. All the old four-posters, which our grandmothers sent to the garret, are on their way back again to the model bedroom. With all our rage for ventilation and fresh air, we no longer fear the bed curtains which a few years ago were supposed to foster disease and death; because the model bedroom can now be furnished with a ventilator for admitting the fresh, and one permitting the egress of the foul air. Each gas bracket is provided with a pipe placed above it, which pierces the wall and through which the product of combustion is carried out of the house. This is a late sanitary improvement in London, and is being introduced in New York.
As for the bed curtains, they are hung on rods with brass rings, no canopy on top, so that the curtains can be shaken and dusted freely. This is a great improvement on the old upholstered top, which recalls Dickens's description of Mrs. Todger's boarding-house, where at the top of the stairs "the odour of many generations of dinners had gathered and had never been dispelled." In like manner the unpleasant feeling that perhaps whole generations of sleepers had breathed into the same upholstery overhead, used to haunt the wakeful, in old English inns, to the murdering of sleep.
There is a growing admiration, unfortunately, for tufted bedsteads. They are in the long run neither clean nor wholesome, and not easily kept free from vermin; but they are undeniably handsome, and recall the imperial beds of state apartments, where kings and queens are supposed to seek that repose which comes so unwillingly to them, but so readily to the plough-boy. These upholstered, tufted, satin-covered bedsteads should be fitted with a canopy, and from this should hang a baldachin and side curtains. Certain very beautiful specimens of this regal arrangement, bought in Italy, are in the Vanderbilt palaces in New York. Opulent purchasers can get copies at the great furnishing-houses, but it is becoming difficult to get the real antiques. Travellers in Brittany find the most wonderful carved bedsteads built into the wall, and are always buying them of the astonished fisher-folk, who have no idea how valuable is their smoke-stained, carved oak.
But as to the making up of the bed. There are nowadays cleanly springs and hair mattresses, in place of the old feather-beds; and as to stiff white bedcovers, pillowslips and shams, false sheets and valenciennes trimmings, monogrammed and ruffled fineries, there is a truce. They were so slippery, so troublesome, and so false withal, that the beds that have known them shall know them no more forever. They had always to be unpinned and unhooked before the sleeper could enter his bed; and they were the torment of the housemaid. They entailed a degree of washing and ironing which was endless, and yet many a young housekeeper thought them indispensable. That idea has gone out completely. The bed now is made up with its fresh linen sheets, its clean blankets and its Marseilles quilt, with square or long pillow as the sleeper fancies, with bolster in plain linen sheath. Then over the whole is thrown a light lace cover lined with Liberty silk. This may be as expensive or as cheap as the owner pleases. Or the spreads may be of satin covered with Chinese embroidery, Turkish Smyrniote, or other rare things, or of the patchwork or decorative art designs now so fashionable. One light and easily aired drapery succeeds the four or five pieces of unmanageable linen. If the bed is a tester and the curtains of silk or chintz, the bed-covering should match in tint. In a very pretty bedroom the walls should be covered with chintz or silk.
The modern highly glazed tile paper for walls and ceiling is an admirable covering, as it refuses to harbour dirt, and the housemaid's brush can keep it sweet and clean. Wall papers are so pretty and so exquisite in design that it seems hardly necessary to do more than mention them. Let us hope the exasperating old rectangular patterns, which have confused so many weary brains and haunted so many a feverish pillow, are gone forever.
The floors should be of plain painted wood, varnished, than which nothing can be cleaner; or perhaps of polished or oiled wood of the natural colour, with parquetried borders. If this is impossible cover with dark-stained mattings, which are as clean and healthful as possible. These may remain down all winter, and rugs may be laid over them at the fireplace and near the bed, sofa, etc. Readily lifted and shaken, rugs have all the comfort of carpets, and none of their disadvantages.
Much is said of the unhealthfulness of gas in bedrooms, but if it does not escape, it is not unhealthful. The prettiest illumination is by candles in the charming new candlesticks in tin and brass, which are as nice as Roman lamps.
On the old bedsteads of Cromwell's time we find a shelf running across the head of the bed, just above the sleeper's head,—placed there for the posset cup. This is now utilized for a safety lamp, for those who indulge in the pernicious practice of reading in bed; but it is even better used as a receptacle for the book, the letter-case, the many little things which an invalid may need, and it saves calling a nurse.
All paint used in a model bedroom should be free from poison. The fireplace should be tiled, and the windows made with a deep beading on the sill. This is a piece of wood like the rest of the frame, which comes up two or three inches in front of the lower part of the window. The object of this is to admit of the lower sash being raised without causing a draught. The room is thus ventilated by the air which filters through the slight aperture between the upper and lower sashes. Above all things have an open fireplace in the bedroom. Abolish stoves from that sacred precinct. Use wood for fuel if possible; if not, the softest of cannel-coal.
Have brass rods placed, on which to hang portières in winter. Portières and curtains may be cheaply made of ingrain carpet embroidered; or of Turkish or Indian stuffs; splendid Delhi pulgaries, a mass of gold silk embroidered, with bits of looking-glass worked in; of velvet; camel's-hair shawls; satin, chintz, or cretonne. Costly thy portières as thy purse can buy; nothing is so pretty and so ornamental.