The perfect câche-feu has yet to be invented, but until some clever genius has done this, either of the above ideas answers quite well; but I do solemnly warn my readers against fashionable trellis-work with paper ivy and grapes wandering over it, fans outstretched in plush with senseless photographs let in--as if photographs could be in place on the hearth!--and all the thousand and one freaks of fashion that are brought out by those who ought to know better, and who have filled many houses to overflowing with terrible plush frames, soiled satin bags, useless odds and ends, and ghastly painted tables, brackets, and stands, which are costly to begin with, and so we do not like to dispose of them too hastily, and which should never be seen in the houses of those who really want to have an artistic and pretty home; with which solemn warning we will pass on to sterner subjects, and will consider in another chapter how to treat the more ‘manly’ portion of the house, where work or pleasure may be gone in for. CHAPTER IV. THE BILLIARD-ROOM AND LIBRARY. ‘There must be nothing frivolous, light, or airy in the aspect of either of these rooms; all must be sombre and steady, if not dark;’ and though I do not go so far as this--the ordinary dictum of the upholsterer--I am quite willing to allow that in the billiard-room at least lightness and frivolity are out of place, albeit I cannot allow that even this room need be sombre and dreary, while certainly it ought to light up well, as it is a room which is generally used merely at night. Wherever it can be afforded, and wherever there are young men or lads in the house, there should always be a billiard-table, and the girls should be encouraged to play with their brothers and their brothers’ friends as long as their mother or father can remain in the room as some sort of guard and guide; the pleasanter home is made the less inclination will young men have to go elsewhere for their amusements, and if they are accustomed to be made happy and feel that their friends are welcome too, they will not keep outside home for the pleasure that is to be found without crossing the threshold. A billiard-room in winter, a couple of good tennis-courts in summer, and the hours of leisure will pass comfortably along, and leave neither time nor opportunities for less desirable pleasures. Example is everything in a house: a thousand sermons will not speak as loudly against betting, and gambling, and drink--the horrors of my existence--as will the example of a house where such things are never allowed, and yet where amusements of all kinds are not frowned upon and refused, where games are encouraged for their own sakes, and where a healthy outdoor life replaces the bar-frequenting, loafing hours, which are all too often the portion of those who have been accustomed to ‘nipping’ and loafing, because they have seen these two habits allowed as a matter of course from their earliest days.