The Lady's Country Companion; Or, How to Enjoy a Country Life RationallyLoudon, Mrs. (Jane)
General
The Lady's Country Companion; Or, How to Enjoy a Country Life Rationally
Loudon, Mrs. (Jane)
Cooking; Country life; Home economics
The _dining-room_ should be characterised by the massive appearance
of its furniture, and the richness of its hangings. The curtains
may be of maroon-coloured cloth, or moreen, trimmed with gold. The
carpet should be Turkey or Axminster, and need not quite cover the
room, but may leave a part to be rubbed bright or painted. You should
have a large handsome chimney-piece, and a large grate, so contrived
with a plate at the bottom, as to contain wood as well as coal. Some
persons advise having no light in a dining-room except from one large
chandelier hung just over the dinner-table, but sufficiently high above
it to cast no shade; while others recommend side lights to show the
pictures, if there should be any, on the walls. If there are, they may
be of quite a different character from those in the drawingroom, and of
more solemn and serious subjects, though still not painful ones; and
they may include pictures by the Dutch masters, and those by English
artists in the domestic style. Your dining-room is very conveniently
placed in being so near the kitchen; and it is also convenient to have
folding-doors opening into both the dining-room and the drawingroom,
placed exactly opposite each other. The passage or vestibule between
them is useful in keeping out sounds from the drawingroom, and also
the smell of dinner; and it may easily be made ornamental by filling
the end next the window with greenhouse plants in flower. These will
also have a good effect from the hall; and in addition to them, the
vestibule may contain a bust or some choice piece of sculpture, before
which may be placed a lamp. The sideboard in the dining-room may be
placed in the recess left for it.
I have now given you all the advice that I think you will find
requisite; for, after all, you must remember that, notwithstanding any
thing I may have said, the furniture and decorations of the rooms must
depend principally on your own taste; I can do no more than point out
what kind of style is suitable to the different rooms, and you must do
the rest.
LETTER IV.
FLIES.--SERVANTS' OFFICES, INCLUDING THE HOUSEKEEPER'S ROOM AND
STORE-CLOSET, THE KITCHEN, AND THE SCULLERY.--BREWING; MAKING HOME-MADE
WINES, CIDER, AND PERRY; AND MAKING BREAD, ROLLS, CAKES, RUSKS, MUFFINS
AND CRUMPETS, AND BISCUITS.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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