ion. These must be left open
occasionally to ventilate the case, for books must have air and light
to keep them fresh and sweet and free from dampness, but not sun to
fade their covers. Intense artificial heat also affects them badly,
wherefore, the upper part of the room being the hotter, cases should
never be more than eight feet high, the use of window seat and other
low cases having very decided advantages, apart from their decorative
value. Whatever the design of the case--and, of course, it must
harmonize with the other wood of the room--its shelves must be easily
adjustable to books of different heights, standing in compact rows and
not half opened to become permanently warped and spoiled. Varnished or
painted shelves grow sticky with heat and form a strong attachment for
their contents. The bookcase curtain is useful more as a protection
against dust than as an art adjunct, for there is nothing more
delightful to the cultivated eye than the brave front presented by
even, symmetrical rows of well-bound volumes, so suggestive of hours of
profitable companionship. All the books must be taken down frequently
and first beaten separately, then in pairs, and dusted, top and covers,
with a soft brush or a small feather duster.

"The true University of these days is a Collection of Books," and one's
education cannot begin too early.

PICTURES

So many homes combining taste and elegance and refinement in their
furnishing, still impress one with the feeling that somewhere within
the lute there is a rift which destroys its perfect harmony, and that
rift is not far to seek--it lies in the pictures. Cheap chromos,
lithographs, and woodcuts have small excuse for being in these days of
fine reproductions in photographs, photogravures, and engravings, and
their presence in a home indicates not only a lopsided development of
the artistic sense, but an indifference to that beauty of which art is
but one of the expressions. Happy, indeed, is the homemaker in
realizing the necessity and privilege of growing up to the works of
artists who have seen beauty where she would have been blind, and felt
to a depth which she has not known; for in that realization lies the
promise of ability to rise to the point where she will at last be able
to feel as the artist felt when he wrought.

ART SENSE

Mrs. Lofty, who never has to stop to count the cost, loses the valuable
art education which our housewife all unconsciously a