HOUSE AND GARDEN 
5i 
July, 1911 
as even a minor art can hardly be com¬ 
prehended here. Yet not on that account 
is it less vitally significant among the peo¬ 
ple who practice it. The causes of the 
glorious flowering forth of all the arts in 
Japan during many centuries, and with 
surprisingly few periods of decadence, 
are to be sought in the truth that basically 
all life is art and that this keenly sensi¬ 
tive people endeavor to make the sim¬ 
plest, most ordinary arts of living an ex¬ 
pression of fine art. 
Possibilities in Half-timbered 
Houses 
(Continued from page 25) 
have been monotonous and weak looking. 
As it is, it seems to be well locked to¬ 
gether. The horizontal beams on a line 
with the window sills, carried across the 
face of the building, and the horizontal 
beam a little below the overhang in the 
central gable, make a number of small 
square, or nearly square, panels forming 
an agreeable checkered motive. 
Diagonal timbers crossing and halved 
into vertical posts are both pleasing and 
useful. Sometimes diagonals running in 
opposite directions cross saltire-wise and 
make an elongated St- Andrew’s cross. 
This device, of course, adds strength and 
materially helps the decoration. In sev¬ 
eral bays of the Port Sunlight houses 
parallel diagonal timbers, convergent tow¬ 
ards the central vertical and horizontal 
beams, have been happily used and give 
the whole bay a lozenge-shaped look. Al¬ 
ternate bays of diagonals interchanging 
with post and panel work extending across 
the face of the building prevent monotony 
and destroy all danger of hardness of 
lines. A still further method of securing 
variety is by the use of a number of 
smaller panels under windows. In the 
Essex Fells house the spaces under a 
number of the windows have been filled 
by small panels in which two divergent 
diagonals and a short upright beam 
spring fan-wise from a common base. In 
the gables of the Stanley house in Ches¬ 
ter, on each side of the vertical post run¬ 
ning from the sill of the overhang to the 
peak of the gables, are parallel flamboy¬ 
ant curved beams springing from the cen¬ 
tral post and from the sill. The effect is 
airy and wavy. Too many decorative mo¬ 
tives in timber work should not be brought 
together in the same house or the whole 
appearance becomes macaronic. 
Attention must be called to the pins and 
bolts that fasten the timbers together. It 
is ever the little things that make the big 
things, and we cannot be too careful in a 
nice adjustment of the smallest details if 
we would have the ensemble wholly suc¬ 
cessful. The treatment of the pins and 
bolts on the Port Sunlight houses well ex¬ 
emplifies the importance of heeding this 
small matter. 
The Good Road 
For Universal Service! 
Every man’s home faces on a road which 
connects with every other road and leads 
to every other home throughout the whole 
land. 
Main highways connect with cross-roads 
so that a man can go where he chooses, 
easily and comfortably if conditions are 
favorable. But the going is not always the 
same; some roads are good—some are bad. 
The experts in the South illustrate the 
difference by showing four mules drawing 
two bales of cotton slowly over a poor, 
muddy cross-road, and two mules drawing 
eight bales oi cotton rapidly over a first- 
class macadam highway. 
The Bell Telephone lines are the roads 
over which the speech of the nation passes. 
The highways and byways of personal 
communication are the 12,000,000 miles of 
wire connecting 6,000,000 telephones in 
homeson these highways. Steadily the lines 
are being extended to every man’s home. 
The public demands that all the roads 
of talk shall be good roads. It is not 
enough to have a system that is universal; 
there must be macadamized highways 
for talk all the way to every man’s home.. 
A single section of bad telephone line is 
enough to block communication or confine 
it to the immediate locality. 
Good going on the telephone lines 
is only possible with one policy and 
one system. Good going everywhere, 
at all times, is the aim of the Bell system. 
American Telephone and Telegraph Company 
And Associated Companies 
One Policy 
One System 
Universal Service 
DR.ICES marked in plain figures will 
always be found EXCEEDINGLY 
LOW when compared with the best 
values obtainable elsewhere. 
Geo. C. Flint Co. 
43-47 W. 23rd ST. 24-28 W. 24th ST. 
:V~Alrlx~ NO- 
after DINNER MINT* 
Temptingly dainty creams that melt in 
the mouth, leaving a refresh¬ 
ing mint flavor. 
Sold only in tin boxes, 
never sold in bulk 
We also manufacture 
U-All-No Mint 
Chewing Gum 
MANUFACTURING CO. OF AMERICA 
463 North 12th St. 
Philadelphia, U. S. A. 
In writing to advertisers please mention House and Garden. 
