The editor will gladly answer queries pertaining to 
individual problems of interior decoration and furnish¬ 
ing. When an immediate reply is desired, a self-addressed 
stamped envelope should be enclosed. This department 
will also purchase any of the articles here described for 
subscribers living at a distance, or will furnish the names 
of the places where they may be obtained. 
Modern Gas Appliances 
URING the warm weather of the 
midsummer months the use of the 
ordinary coal stove is next to impossible. 
The improved types of gas stoves will be 
found an efficient substitute, and, more¬ 
over, recent developments and improve¬ 
ments in the use of gas for various house¬ 
hold purposes have done so much toward 
saving labor and providing facilities for 
doing certain kinds of work in the easiest 
and most cleanly manner, that a house 
fitted with these different appliances is 
practically a model establishment so far 
as conveniences go. The gas stove has 
been accepted as a matter of course, and 
the gas fixture has been considered a back 
number for so long a time that it comes 
as rather a surprise to find how many new 
and attractive features there are in both, 
and to realize that in the development of 
modern conveniences gas has played a 
most important part. 
There has probably been no more im¬ 
portant innovation in the way of lighting 
than a recently devised scheme by which 
the light in the central fixture of a room 
can be turned on by a push button in the 
wall, similar to that used for an electric 
light. This is done, not with a pilot light, 
but by means of a small battery just strong 
enough to produce a spaik, which is con¬ 
cealed in the wall and wired to the gas 
fixture. The installation of this push but¬ 
ton system is quite a simple matter, and 
the wires can be connected with any fix¬ 
ture at little trouble or expense. 
The gas lights themselves are adaptable 
to all forms of fixtures now in use, and 
with the lovely shades and globes that are 
in vogue they furnish a soft and satisfac¬ 
tory form of illumination as different 
from the old-fashioned gas jet as can well 
be imagined. For the central light or 
dome there is a new arrangement by which 
the entire under side of the dome is cov¬ 
ered with translucent glass, that diffuses 
the light and eliminates the glare, produc¬ 
ing much the same effect as the indirect 
system of lighting. This is most desirable 
for a dining room, as a soft, steady light 
is thrown over the whole table without 
shining disagreeably in any one person’s 
eyes. 
For the general illumination of a room 
in which no central light is required for 
reading or working there is nothing more 
satisfactory or better looking than the side 
bracket, and with the various kinds of gas 
mantels now in use the bracket light is 
quite as practical as any other sort, and 
can of course be designed to correspond 
with the general decorations of the room. 
The pilot light is being quite generally 
used on lamps for library tables and other 
lights that are in constant service, and 
proves a decided convenience in doing 
away with the use of matches, while even 
the up-to-date models in gas stoves are 
One of the new gas appliances is a plate warmer built 
into the cupboard in the butler’s pantry 
furnished with a pilot light, eliminating 
the match still further from the scheme of 
household work. 
Quite the newest addition to the list of 
gas appliances for lightening work in the 
culinary department is a plate warmer 
built into the cupboard in the butler’s pan¬ 
try. It is simply one compartment of the 
cupboard made in any desired size and’ 
lined with asbestos, over which is a layer 
of planished steel, with shelves of plan¬ 
ished steel. Beneath the lowest shelf is a 
gas pipe with several small burners that 
provide just enough heat to keep the 
shelves at the right temperature for warm¬ 
ing plates. The doors of this compart¬ 
ment are on spring hinges, so that they 
close automatically, and in this way the 
heat is retained in the closet and none of 
it is wasted. Situated as the butler’s pan¬ 
try usually is, between kitchen and dining 
room, this warming closet arrangement 
does away with the necessity of having to* 
carry all of the plates and dishes into the 
kitchen to be warmed before being taken 
to the table, for they can be gathered up 
in passing through the butler’s pantry. 
The water-heater, while by no means a 
novelty, is being constantly improved 
upon, and there is nothing, with the pos¬ 
sible exception of the gas stove, that has 
contributed more to household comfort 
and convenience. Whether in the summer 
home or the all-year-round house that has. 
no central heating plant, the gas water 
heater makes the household perfectly in¬ 
dependent in regard to the number of 
baths desired, and an unlimited supply of 
hot water is always at hand. The point 
of perfection has undoubtedly been 
reached in the gas heater supplied with a 
pilot light and so arranged that whenever 
a hot water tap is turned on in any part 
of the house the gas lights automatically 
and stays lighted as long as the water is 
left running. 
Incidentally, this idea is used still fur¬ 
ther in an attachment for the stationary 
washstand in the form of a spray at the 
end of a nickel pipe that curves high over 
the basin and can be turned to one side, 
quite out of the way when not in use. By 
turning the pipe so that the spray comes 
over the basin both hot and cold water 
40 
