However, lest I weary my readers in dwelling on this subject, about which one cannot say too much, I think I will now simply speak of the decoration of the billiard-room, having, I hope, so judiciously sandwiched the powder between the jam in this chapter, that those who seek for information about the room itself may unawares come upon it, and so be forced to meditate, whether they like it or not, on some of the reasons why so many people dread the idea of a billiard-room where there are boys. If gambling were non-existent, the veriest Chadband might learn to handle the cue; while a pastor at a dissenting chapel need not dread the eyes of his deacons were he found disporting himself in the halls of the ungodly, which would cease to be ungodly, or be no more so than the harmless tennis-courts, were betting eliminated from among their charms, and nothing but the game itself really and truly encouraged and allowed. A big room is a necessity for a billiard-room, which should never, by any chance, be shorter than twenty-six feet long by twenty broad; a full-sized table measures twelve feet by six, and the size I have spoken of only allows sufficient comfortable room for walking round the table, and for the usual raised seats which are always put at the ends and on one side of the room. Personally, I should prefer a much larger room still, as I like to see one end of the room furnished as a species of sitting-room; but, of course, in London the twenty-six by twenty room would be ample. In the country, the billiard-table comes in for days when shooting is impossible, and the sitting-room end there is a great advantage in more ways than one. Quite a charming billiard-room can be made by using all brown paint and a high dado, to the top of the door, of brown and gold Japanese leather paper; above the dado the wall should be painted _café-au-lait_; the cornice should be replaced by a coving, which should terminate in a top-light, from whence the ordinary cross-lights could be hung for use at night, and these surely could be in beaten iron with some prettier shades than the hideous green things which match the equally hideous cloth, which I hope to see replaced soon by something a little more artistic, say in such a room as the one I have just described, by a dull brown cloth, which surely would be every bit as satisfactory as the green, which is certainly the most aggressive shade of green which has ever been made. In this case the shades could be blue, with some lace over them, or the yellow with no lace at all.