what we
can do with old ones."

"Now, you see, Mary," said John, seating himself on a lime-cask which
the plasterers had left, and taking out his memorandum-book,--"you
see, I've calculated this thing all over; I've found a way by which I
can make our rooms beautiful and attractive without a cent expended on
new furniture."

"Well, let's hear."

"Well, my way is short and simple. We must put things into our rooms
that people will look at, so that they will forget to look at the
furniture, and never once trouble their heads about it. People never
look at furniture so long as there is anything else to look at; just
as Napoleon, when away on one of his expeditions, being told that the
French populace were getting disaffected, wrote back, 'Gild the _dome
des Invalides_,' and so they gilded it, and the people, looking at
that, forgot everything else."

"But I'm not clear yet," said Mary, "what is coming of this
rhetoric."

"Well, then, Mary, I'll tell you. A suit of new carved black-walnut
furniture, severe in taste and perfect in style, such as I should
choose at David & Saul's, could not be got under three hundred
dollars, and I haven't the three hundred to give. What, then, shall we
do? We must fall back on our resources; we must look over our
treasures. We have our proof cast of the great glorious head of the
Venus di Milo; we have those six beautiful photographs of Rome, that
Brown brought to us; we have the great German lithograph of the
San Sisto Mother and Child, and we have the two angel heads, from the
same; we have that lovely golden twilight sketch of Heade's; we have
some sea photographs of Bradford's; we have an original pen-and-ink
sketch by Billings; and then, as before, we have 'our picture.'
What has been the use of our watching at the gates and waiting at the
doors of Beauty all our lives, if she hasn't thrown us out a crust
now and then, so that we might have it for time of need? Now, you
see, Mary, we must make the toilet of our rooms just as a pretty
woman makes hers when money runs low, and she sorts and freshens her
ribbons, and matches them to her hair and eyes, and, with a bow here
and a bit of fringe there, and a button somewhere else, dazzles us
into thinking that she has an infinity of beautiful attire. Our rooms
are new and pretty of themselves, to begin with; the tint of the
paper, and the rich coloring of the border, corresponding with the
furniture and carpets, will make them seem pre