C26 THE AMERICAN FARMER. 



tasteful and attractive, and to avoid that severity of plainness that characterizes country 

 houses generally. 



Every farm-house should have a bright, sunny and pleasant kitchen. &quot;We mention this 

 room first, because it is where the majority of farmers wives spend much of their life in 

 performing the daily tasks for their household. Therefore this room should be located in 

 the most pleasant and cheerful part of the house. Next in importance should be the sitting- 

 room, where the family spend their evenings, and the wife and daughters perform the sewing 

 for the family in the afternoons, when the general housework for the day is done, and where, 

 in the long, winter evenings, the hours should be diversified with reading aloud by some member 

 of the family, or enlivened by music, while old garments are being rejuvenated, or new ones 

 made by skillful hands. This room can also be used as a library if necessary, for all 

 farmers should have something of a library the more books the better, if of the right kind. 



In many country houses the kitchen is large, and serves the purpose of both cook and 

 dining-room. A better arrangement than this would be, to have the kitchen made just large 

 enough to serve the purpose of cook-room and general house-work, with a good-sized dining- 

 room leading from it. 



Opening into the sitting-room there should be a good-sized bedroom, which may serve, 

 when occasion requires, for a &quot; sick-room.&quot; This room should be well lighted, and located 

 on a sunny side of the house; it should contain an open fire-place or grate for heating in cold 

 weather, and also for purposes of better ventilation. A parlor is a great convenience, since 

 it is not always desirable to introduce callers into the sitting-room. But we do not 

 approve of a parlor,* as such, or as is generally found in most dwellings, which is a 

 room set apart for the &quot;best things&quot; things regarded too choice and sacred for the common 

 use of the family the best carpet, furniture, pictures, books, &c. and into which the family 

 rarely enter, except to entertain visitors. Nothing should be too good or choice for the en 

 joyment of the family circle every day, and nothing should be used by the family too ignoble 

 and poor to be seen by visitors. The parlor should be a place to be freely enjoyed, when 

 desired, by the entire household, a kind of second family room, to be appropriated as con 

 venience requires. 



In every farm-house there should always be one room set apart for the children, to be 

 used as a play-room by them at will. It should be large and airy, and located on a sunny 

 side of the house. The pantry should be of good size, and conveniently arranged adjacent 

 to the kitchen, in order to avoid unnecessary steps in doing the work. 



The cellar -door and door leading to the wood-house should also open into the kitchen. 

 A wash-room or laundry, and a room for the storage of groceries, should also be on this floor, 

 unless such arrangements are made in the basement. 



If cheese and butter are made on the farm, separate rooms will be required for the milk 

 and the storage of cheese, either in the dwelling-house or in a small dairy-house suited to 

 the purpose. The dining-room should contain a china-closet. Another closet in this room 

 for the storage of other things would also be a great convenience. 



Every bedroom and chamber should also contain a good-sized closet. Closets are of 

 great utility in a dwelling, and there can scarcely be too many of them. 



In planning such conveniences for a house, a woman s judgment and ingenuity will 

 generally be more suggestive and reliable than a man s, as her business pertains more to such 

 matters ; hence the farmer should always consult his wife and daughter in this respect. 



Perhaps the reader may hava heard of the wealthy gentleman who established and 

 liberally endowed a now popular institution for the education of young ladies, and that in 

 the large and costly edifice erected for the purpose, and planned by the donor, the young 

 ladies who became pupils found, to their utter consternation, not a single closet from attic to 

 basement ! 



