The hall grate should be on the smallest scale possible, should have a plain wooden mantel and small over-mantel consisting of a wooden frame and a slip of bevelled looking-glass, and should have tiles for a hearth and a surround, and should be provided with a high guard similar to those found in all nurseries, but in brass, not in common painted wire. On the mantel we could put one or two framed photographs and about four glasses for flowers, and also a small clock, should the hall not be sufficiently large to allow us to have the proper tall one there; but great care should be taken not to overdo the ornaments here especially, for a hall gathers dust in a dreadful manner, and too many ornaments mean dirt, and therefore should in no way be encouraged. The walls of the hall should have pictures on them; there is no doubt about that, and good autotypes and Burne-Jones’s photographs from Mr Hollyer of 9 Pembroke Square, W., are the best to have. They should be framed in the simple reeded frames sold by the Autotype Company, New Oxford Street, and should be hung judiciously. The lowest should just, and only just, escape the dado-rail, the highest should be only a couple of inches above it at the outside. There should, of course, be no pictures whatever in the vestibule portion of the hall, neither in the hall itself should there be any brackets for china, nor over-doors on which pots and vases can be placed, for the maid must always get the steps to dust these places and, in consequence, dusting, is, at the best very seldom, at the worst never done. But over every door in the halls and passages must be placed _portières_ of some kind or other. I have come to the conclusion that a couple of curtains is the best arrangement for this, if the doors open into the rooms, as they generally do in a small hall; if not, of course the rod, which opens and shuts with the door, and which Burnett sells for 4s. 6d. complete, must be used. The pair of curtains allows the servant to hold one back for the visitor’s entrance as she opens the door, but they must be crossed at the top by putting the last hook on each curtain in the ring that comes last on the one belonging to its fellow; this prevents them from gaping open, and always keeps them in place. Suppose each curtain has six hooks, one puts five belonging to the left-hand curtain on the left-hand set of rings; in the sixth, one puts hook No. 1 of the right-hand curtain; hook No. 6 of the left-hand curtain goes into hook No. 1 of the right-hand one; the other five rings are filled by the remaining five hooks then on the right-hand curtain, and this ensures the curtains remaining always in their place in the most satisfactory way possible. The best material for hall curtains is undoubtedly Wallace’s diamond serge, and it should be lined with sateen the same colour as that chosen for the curtains, and should be edged with grip-cord. The glazed surface of the sateen resists the