Practical Suggestions for Mother and Housewife

by Marion Mills Miller

China and glassware and silver arranged in proper array in wall closets, cabinets, and sideboards are the most appropriate decorations of the dining-room. It is not at all necessary that there should be pictures on the wall of game, fruit and flowers, or "still life" studies of vegetables and kitchen utensils. Indeed, these have become so expected that a change is quite a relief to a guest, who would welcome even the death's head that was the invariable ornament of the Egyptian feasts. Any pictures which are lively and cheerful in suggestion are suitable. Those that have a story to tell or a lesson to point are never out of place in a room frequented by children.

For convenience the table-linen should be kept in drawers or lockers built beneath the shelves containing the china. A butler's pantry is not an essential when such arrangements as these are made.

The kitchen, pantry, storeroom, and laundry form, as it were, the "factory" of the house, with the range as the central "engine." Accordingly they should be planned with respect to each other to save steps. Fortunately this means also saving expense in construction. Architects have been most ingenious as well as practical in perfecting these arrangements, and the housebuilder, therefore, needs no advice from us.

It cannot be too much emphasized, however, that the cellar is, from the standpoints of sanitation and comfort, the most important part of the house. There should be no attempt to save expense by limiting its proper size, materials for walls, windows for ventilation, drainage, etc., for money so saved will inevitably be paid out many times over in coal bills, doctor's fees, and, perhaps, undertaker's bills. A dry cellar must be secured at all costs, for the air from it permeates the whole house. Where this is damp, it leads not alone to disease among the inmates, but to the disintegration of the house itself, through what is called "dry rot," but is paradoxically the result of dampness. Edgar Allan Poe, in his weird story, "The Fall of the House of Usher," has given a mystical interpretation of the dissolution of an old homestead which really has a scientific explanation that might be found in the cellar.

The proper floor of a cellar is a layer of broken stones in which tile drains are laid, having outlets into a common drain, and over which a layer of concrete is placed, The walls, of plastered stone, brick, or concrete, should rise above the ground far enough to permit small windows, and prevent the admission of surface water from rain or snow. These windows should open from within, upward, and there should be hooks on the ceiling to keep them open for ventilation.

Where a house is heated by a furnace, the style of this should be selected with great care, special regard being had to the economy of fuel. The systems of steam-heating, hot-water heating, or hot-air heating have each their merits, depending on the location of the house and the climate of the region. The cellar can also be used as a storeroom for those things not affected by the heat of the furnace, such as perishable food requiring an ice-box or a cool place, vegetables, especially those with a penetrating odor; apples, canned fruit and goods, etc., should be kept here, and barrels of commodities, such as vinegar, that are bought in large quantities. Shelves should be built on the walls and hooks hung on the rafters to increase the facilities for storage. Articles hung upon the hooks should be tied in paper bags. It is well to have the cellar ceiled, to keep out the dust of the house and reduce the risk of fire. Here, of course, is the natural place for the coal-bin, and, when there are no out-buildings, the man's workshop. The laundry may also be placed in the cellar, and, in stormy weather, the clothes hung there to dry. In the country the cellar is a good place in which to build an ice-vault.

The kitchen should, of course, be airy and sunny. The sink should be placed near a south window, if possible, to prevent freezing of pipes. An iron sink is more cleanly than a wooden one, and cheaper than porcelain and copper. It should have a platform with room for two dishpans, and a drying shelf, raised at one end to permit drainage. Where economy of space is essential, this shelf may be removable, permitting the use for other things of the table beneath.

Two other tables are necessary in a proper kitchen equipment, one covered with zinc for a work-table, set near the range, and the other a plain table set near the dining-room, for the prepared dishes. There should be three lights, lamps in brackets, gas-jets, or electric bulbs, near the sink, range and food-table respectively. The refrigerator should be put outside the kitchen, in some such place as a sheltered part of the back piazza. Commodities such as tea and coffee, not requiring ice, should be kept in covered jars, preferably earthen, on a dresser or shelf, where the bread-box may also stand. There should be a kitchen closet for the flour-barrel and sugar-box, which should be covered for further protection from dust, flies, dampness, etc., and for the canned goods in immediate requisition.

The stove or range should be selected with reference on the one hand to the amount of cooking to be done for the family, and on the other to the saving of fuel. Where there is a water supply, of course there should be a boiler connected with the range. This should be large enough to assure a sufficient supply of hot water for the house. There should be a shelf near the range for such articles as the pepper-box and salt-box which are in constant use in cooking, and hooks should be near at hand for hanging up the poker, lid-lifter, and a coarse towel for use in taking pans from the oven. Other shelves and hooks, of course, should be put in for the various utensils necessary in the kitchen.

The floor of the kitchen should be covered with a good quality of linoleum. A perforated rubber mat may be placed at the sink, although this is not necessary. In fact, it is a better plan for the woman in the kitchen, as indeed elsewhere, to get rubber heels for her shoes. The Arabs have a proverb that to him who is shod it is as if the whole world were covered with leather, and rubber heels similarly cause every floor in the house, whether bare or carpeted, to be equally easy to the feet of the busy housewife.