ROOF-TREE 249 



with a due regard to the fitness of things, his house 

 will always be a wound, an object of offense upon 

 the fair face of the landscape. Indeed, to build a 

 house that shall not offend the wise eye, that shall 

 not put Nature and all her gentle divinities to 

 shame, is the great problem. In such matters, not 

 to displease the eye is to please the heart. 



Probably the most that is to be aimed at in 

 domestic architecture is negative beauty, a condition 

 of things which invites or suggests beauty to those 

 who are capable of the sentiment, because a house, 

 truly viewed, is but a setting, a background, and is 

 not to be pushed to the front and made much of for 

 its own sake. It is for shelter, for comfort, for 

 health and hospitality, to eat in and sleep in, to be 

 born in and to die in, and it is to accord in appear- 

 ance with homely every- day usages, and with natu- 

 ral, universal objects and scenes. Indeed, is any- 

 thing but negative beauty to be aimed at in the 

 interior decorations as well ? The hangings are but 

 a background for the pictures, and are to give tone 

 and atmosphere to the rooms ; while the whole inte- 

 rior is but a background for the human form, and 

 for the domestic life to be lived there. 



It may be observed that what we call beauty of 

 nature is mainly negative beauty; that is, the mass, 

 the huge rude background, made up of rocks, trees, 

 hills, mountains, plains, water, etc., has not beauty 

 as a positive quality, visible to all eyes, but affords 

 the mind the conditions of beauty, namely, health, 

 strength, fitness, etc., beauty being an experience 



