A “_voorhuis_,” as it appears in an inventory of 1686, contains a very handsome marble table with a carved wooden frame, a table covered with a handsome cloth, and a very fine tall clock. The seats consisted of seven Russia leather chairs and one matted chair furnished with a cushion. The room was lighted with three glass windows with leaden frames, handsomely curtained, and eleven pictures decorated the walls. The value of this furniture was £125 in present money. In many houses the second floor was only used for “show rooms,” and the family slept in either the lower or the top floor. Bernagie writes: “If you go through the town, you will find many houses where the husband is afraid so much as even to smell at his second floor rooms. They always remain downstairs. Have they ever so many courtly rooms, they will eat, for their wives’ sake, in the small back kitchen.” This was the case in most of the burghers’ houses. These show-rooms were used only on some special occasion; otherwise they were never entered except for cleaning. This took place weekly and oftener, with special cleaning in the spring and autumn. Rooms in constant use were daily stripped and cleaned, and the housewife barely allowed herself time to eat. Some enthusiastic housekeepers—although wealthy—would not allow the servants to clean their best rooms, but wielded “the scrubbing-brush, rubbing-towel and floor-cloth.” There are examples of houses where from thirty to forty pails of water were used every day, and where the servants did nothing but rub and scrub and scour from morning till night. Many of the houses were exceedingly damp in consequence, and the inmates constantly ill. Notwithstanding the ridicule the Dutch housewife suffered in books and on the stage, her mania for cleaning was so great that she cared not at all if the house was termed “hell” and the cleaners “she-devils.” In some families home was made still more uncomfortable on account of the little amount of cooking done. Certain dishes were prepared once a week and then “warmed up,” so that the stove would not be soiled. In North Holland a month would sometimes elapse between the making of fires for cooking in the fireplace. All the cooking was done by means of a little boiling water in the fire-pot.