on of blue china, which serves to furnish the
table as well. If the dining-room had a northern exposure, and it was
desirable to use red instead of blue for colouring, as good an effect
could be secured by depending for ornament upon the red Kaga porcelain
so common at present in Japanese and Chinese shops, and using with it
the Eastern cotton known as _bez_. This is dyed with madder, and exactly
repeats the red of the porcelain, while it is extremely durable both in
colour and texture. Borders of yellow stitchery, or straggling fringes
of silk and beads, add very much to the effect of the drapery and to the
character of the room.

[Illustration: DINING-ROOM IN "STAR ROCK" (COUNTRY HOUSE OF W.E. CONNOR,
ESQ., ONTEORA)]

A library in ordinary family life has two parts to play. It is not only
to hold books, but to make the family at home in a literary atmosphere.
Such a room is apt to be a fascinating one by reason of this very
variety of use and purpose, and because it is a centre for all the
family treasures. Books, pictures, papers, photographs, bits of
decorative needlework, all centre here, and all are on most orderly
behaviour, like children at a company dinner. The colour of such a room
may, and should, be much warmer and stronger than that of a parlour pure
and simple, the very constancy and hardness of its use indicating tints
of strength and resistance; but, keeping that in mind, the rules for
general use of colour and harmony of tints will apply as well to a room
used for a double purpose as for a single. Of course the furniture
should be more solid and darker, as would be necessary for constant use,
but the deepening of tones in general colour provides for that, and for
the use of rugs of a different character. In a room of this kind perhaps
the best possible effect is produced by the use of some textile as a
wall-covering, as in that case the same material with a contrasted
colour in the lining can be used for curtains, and to some extent in the
furniture. This use of one material has not only an effect of richness
which is due to the library of the house, but it softens and brings
together all the heterogeneous things which different members of a large
family are apt to require in a sitting-room.

To those who prefer to work out and adapt their own surroundings, it is
well to illustrate the advice given for colour in different exposures by
selecting particular rooms, with their various relations to light,