moat below and was swept away on the seething waters of a " lock."
How often do we meet with persons who have been lamed or had
concussion of the brain through stepping out through some inviting
side-door either into mid-air or down the back stairs " head foremost ! "
Sometimes the doors are so promiscuous and plentiful that you can-
not open one door without its coming in collision with another, and
then you have to keep your mind in a continual anxiety lest the other
door should not be shut at the time you want to open your door.
Perhaps, the other door is a closet or pantry in the wrong place and
the children or the servants are always leaving it half open, and when
the door of the room is half opened the two strike each other, and
it is a question of knobs and hinges which will gracefully recede and
allow the other to open fully, or whether they shall remain " locked
in each other's embrace," while the party inside one door and the
party outside the other door exchange compliments with each other.
There are many things pertaining to house building which are
proper to the limited understanding of man, but there are many
more things in which the mind of women should have architectural
and mechanical jurisdiction. The matter of closets is one for
feminine arbitration. A man's imagination in this department of
domestic science does not extend further than the hat-rack upon
which he hangs his ulster, beaver or wide-awake, and the umbrella-
stand in which he deposits his gingham or walking-stick. But a
woman knows that life without closet-room is life without order, and
that home without plenty of storage room and pegs and shelves is
chaos, confusion, and endless loss of time and goods. "A place for
everything and everything in its place," is only a proverb expressive
of the need of closet-room.
A bright and happy future for the horrfe will one day undoubtedly
be given us by science, art and human perseverance, which shall
make every house fireproof, and enable every one to sleep soundly
without dread of being burned alive. As it is, if the desire of most
house builders had been to provide an easy road for fire to travel
upward and downward and sideways and all around, they could not
HOME ARCHITECTURE. 375
have accomplished it more successfully. Already the minds of our
first architects are occupied with the grand life-saving problem of
how to check a fire when it has been started by non-conducting de-
vices between rooms, ceilings, floors and stairways. When that is
once accomplished, as it will be, there will be no need of fire insur-
ance companies. Moreover, the whole subject of house heating will
be exhaustively considered and made the subject of prize essays and
practical experiments until the evils of the stove, the range, the grate,
the steam-pipes, the dry heat from furnaces, are all modified and cured
and an equal temperature, without the infliction of gas from coal, or
smoke, or excess and defect of warmth in one part of the house and
another, will be diffused in dwelling-houses. To the present in-
equality of temperature in houses one-half of the throat and lung
complaints so prevalent among Americans are traceable.
Page 246
Presented as published in 1883. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
AI-modernized reading of the original text
moat below and was swept away on the seething waters of a " lock." How often do we meet with persons who have been lamed or had concussion of the brain through stepping out through some inviting side-door either into mid-air or down the back stairs " head foremost ! " Sometimes the doors are so promiscuous and plentiful that you cannot open one door without its coming in collision with another, and then you have to keep your mind in a continual anxiety lest the other door should not be shut at the time you want to open your door. Perhaps, the other door is a closet or pantry in the wrong place and the children or the servants are always leaving it half open, and when the door of the room is half opened the two strike each other, and it is a question of knobs and hinges which will gracefully recede and allow the other to open fully, or whether they shall remain " locked in each other's embrace," while the party inside one door and the party outside the other door exchange compliments with each other.
There are many things pertaining to house building which are proper to the limited understanding of man, but there are many more things in which the mind of women should have architectural and mechanical jurisdiction. The matter of closets is one for feminine arbitration. A man's imagination in this department of domestic science does not extend further than the hat-rack upon which he hangs his ulster, beaver or wide-awake, and the umbrellastand in which he deposits his gingham or walking-stick. But a woman knows that life without closet-room is life without order, and that home without plenty of storage room and pegs and shelves is chaos, confusion, and endless loss of time and goods. "A place for everything and everything in its place," is only a proverb expressive of the need of closet-room.
A bright and happy future for the home will one day undoubtedly be given us by science, art and human perseverance, which shall make every house fireproof, and enable every one to sleep soundly without dread of being burned alive. As it is, if the desire of most house builders had been to provide an easy road for fire to travel upward and downward and sideways and all around, they could not
have accomplished it more successfully. Already the minds of our first architects are occupied with the grand life-saving problem of how to check a fire when it has been started by non-conducting devices between rooms, ceilings, floors and stairways. When that is once accomplished, as it will be, there will be no need of fire insurance companies. Moreover, the whole subject of house heating will be exhaustively considered and made the subject of prize essays and practical experiments until the evils of the stove, the range, the grate, the steam-pipes, the dry heat from furnaces, are all modified and cured and an equal temperature, without the infliction of gas from coal, or smoke, or excess and defect of warmth in one part of the house and another, will be diffused in dwelling-houses. To the present inequality of temperature in houses one-half of the throat and lung complaints so prevalent among Americans are traceable.