It is needless to say much for the tile as you know its beauties. It may be cold to the feet, non-resistant and tiring to the back and slippery when wet, but this is overcome by mats of matting, cork or linoleum. Tile is made in every design and color to fit any desire or design. All corners and joints at the base of walls can be curved. It makes a unit of the whole room in design and intention as no other thing does. It can be cleaned out with a small hose. Of course, poor tile cracks. Needless to say, it takes real skill to lay these floors as the under bed of cement has to be very perfect to protect the tile upon it. However, it looks royal, it wears, and is a favorite with great kitchen builders. COMPOSITIONS The floorings of composition, cements and mineral mixtures are innumerable. Some are excellent, embodying nearly all the good points enumerated in this latter. They are a little warmer than tile and not quite so expensive. They have probably a little more foot comfort but not much more. They are fire proof, do not weigh too much for a lightly constructed house, and are kept clean with the usual elbow grease and water. These floors for the most part are made in various colors and designs. In tile and composition the joint at the base of walls can be made practically one with the wall in a curving connection. In the case of linoleum and cork, this joint is either accomplished by a curving connection or more generally by a highly compressed and sealed joint, allowing for absolutely no trapping of foreign matter and rendering the floor easily swept and washed. Many great institutions and some private homes have found these to be practical, so if you observe the “Buy the Best from the Best” rule you cannot go wrong. LINOTILE A newer kind of floor is a cross between a cement and a linoleum. It wears indefinitely and can be highly recommended, as handsome as it comes in tile form, and silent, easily kept clean, resilient and all the good points of cement as well as linoleum. CHAPTER XXVII FEDERALIZING YOUR KITCHEN Fancy a carpenter with his tools all over the room! Fancy a painter with one color here and another color there! Do you think we would have had a Michelangelo if he had been forced to get down from the scaffold every minute for a tool or a bit of clay? And yet women for the most part, women who need their energy for making the home a fit place to live in, still persist in scattering their tools about the kitchens and walk miles daily, because they have not mobilized their tools.