ment should give a sense of close family life rather than
space, while in drawing-rooms it should be exactly the reverse, and this
effect is easily secured by competent use of colour.

CHAPTER IX

LOCATION OF THE HOUSE

Besides the difference in treatment demanded by different use of
rooms--the character of the decoration of the whole house will be
influenced by its situation. A house in the country or a house in town;
a house by the sea-shore or a house situated in woods and fields require
stronger or less strong colour, and even different tints, according to
situation. The decoration itself may be much less conventional in one
place than in another, and in country houses much and lasting charm is
derived from design and colour in perfect harmony with nature's
surroundings. Whatever decorative design is used in wall-coverings or in
curtains or hangings will be far more effective if it bears some
relation to the surroundings and position of the house.

If the house is by the sea the walls should repeat with many variations
the tones of sea and sand and sky; the gray-greens of sand-grasses; the
blues which change from blue to green with every cloud-shadow; the pearl
tints which become rose in the morning or evening light, and the browns
and olives of sea mosses and lichens. This treatment of colour will make
the interior of the house a part of the great out-of-doors and create a
harmony between the artificial shelter and nature.

There is philosophy in following, as far as the limitations of simple
colour will allow, the changeableness and fluidity of natural effects
along the shore, and allowing the mood of the brief summer life to fall
into entire harmony with the dominant expression of the sea. Blues and
greens and pinks and browns should all be kept on a level with
out-of-door colour, that is, they should not be too deep and strong for
harmony with the sea and sky, and if, when harmonious colour is once
secured, most of the materials used in the furnishing of the house are
chosen because their design is based upon, or suggested by, sea-forms,
an impression is produced of having entered into complete and perfect
harmony with the elements and aspects of nature. The artificialities of
life fall more and more into the background, and one is refreshed with a
sense of having established entirely harmonious and satisfactory
relations with the surroundings of nature. I remember a doorway of a
cottage by the sea,