d
dark-green leaves, will also grow finely in such situations, and have
a beautiful effect. These things require daily showering to keep them
fresh, and the moisture arising from them will soften and freshen the
too dry air of heated winter rooms.

* * * * *

Thus I have been through my four essential elements in
housebuilding,--air, fire, water, and earth. I would provide for these
before anything else. After they are secured, I would gratify my taste
and fancy as far as possible in other ways. I quite agree with Bob in
hating commonplace houses, and longing for some little bit of
architectural effect! and I grieve profoundly that every step in that
direction must cost so much. I have also a taste for niceness of
finish. I have no objection to silver-plated door-locks and hinges,
none to windows which are an entire plate of clear glass. I
congratulate neighbors who are so fortunate as to be able to get them;
and after I have put all the essentials into a house, I would have
these too, if I had the means.

But if all my wood work were to be without groove or moulding, if my
mantels were to be of simple wood, if my doors were all to be
machine-made, and my lumber of the second quality, I would have my
bath-rooms, my conservatory, my sunny bow-windows, and my perfect
ventilation; and my house would then be so pleasant, and every one in
it in such a cheerful mood, that it would verily seem to be ceiled
with cedar.

Speaking of ceiling with cedar, I have one thing more to say. We
Americans have a country abounding in beautiful timber, of whose
beauties we know nothing, on account of the pernicious and stupid
habit of covering it with white paint.

The celebrated zebra wood with its golden stripes cannot exceed in
quaint beauty the grain of unpainted chestnut, prepared simply with a
coat or two of oil. The butternut has a rich golden brown, the very
darling color of painters, a shade so rich, and grain so beautiful,
that it is of itself as charming to look at as a rich picture. The
black-walnut, with its heavy depth of tone, works in well as an
adjunct; and as to oak, what can we say enough of its quaint and many
shadings? Even common pine, which has been considered not decent to
look upon till hastily shrouded in a friendly blanket of white paint,
has, when oiled and varnished, the beauty of satin-wood. The second
quality of pine, which has what are called _shakes_ in it, under this
mo