The counterpane of the bed should be one of these nice honeycomb quilts with a deep cotton fringe; in winter and summer both, the eider-down should be always on the bed ready for use, for some of our English summer nights are as cold and chilly as many of the autumn and winter ones; and very charming-looking day coverings for the beds can be bought for one guinea at Marshall and Snelgrove’s, and are called Madras quilts. They have more substance than Madras muslin itself, and are ready trimmed with a neat fringe. Guipure and lace strips make nice quilts too, and very nice covers can be made of cretonne like the curtains edged by the pretty nine-inch goffered frill of which I am so fond; but if Angelina works, beautiful ones can be made from crash or workhouse sheeting, embroidered in scrolls and pomegranates in red chain stitch, a deep border of thicker work, also in a pomegranate pattern, forming an appropriate and very handsome finish to it. These quilts can be bought ready traced and begun at Francis’s, Hanway Street, Oxford Street, W., at 30_s._; they should be lined with sateen, and finished off by a wide border of furniture lace, turned over a band of sateen of any colour that will harmonise with the room itself. A careful servant should brush under the bed daily to pick up any little bits of fluff or dust, and once a week, without fail, all the corners should be turned out and the room thoroughly cleaned. The floor, to be perfect, should be stained all over, polished and rubbed bright, and be furnished with nice rugs, which can be shaken daily, for nothing keeps so clean, and it is undoubtedly healthy, for, much as I like matting, and largely as I use it, it must fill up the corners entirely, and dust cannot help accumulating there, in a bedroom. Furniture for the room itself could be had cheaply, did we know of any man willing to work under our orders, but this seems impossible. I do not know if there are any trades-union rules among carpenters that prevent them working for themselves; but, if not, I am quite sure an honest mechanic could make a large fortune if only he set himself seriously to work, and would keep to reasonable prices. [Illustration: FIG. 19.] Of course, skilled cabinet-making is one thing, and the sort of work I mean is another; but I am constrained to remark on this, because ordinary shops, even the very cheapest, charge such terrible prices for furniture, and I have had such useful things made from my own descriptions by a man in our own employ, that I am sure such a man near London would soon be of almost world-wide fame, and we should all have useful furniture, even if it were not of polished ash and oak, elegantly finished, and in exquisite style. We should, of course, all prefer the very best furniture possible, if we could afford it; but, as we cannot, I should like to find a carpenter as good as my old one, who would work for himself and really give us honest work at honest prices.