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cut meat and vegetables, and the other side for other uses. On shelves in front are stored all the utensils and articles used in cooking meats and vegetables, and in preparing them for the table. In this cooking closet, by an economic arrangement, is stored all the family stores and supplies, and all the utensils for cooking and taking care of food. The shelves should reach to the ceiling, and the highest have small closets to hold articles not often wanted.

In the dish closet, D, is the sink, near both to the stove and the eating-room. Over it, and each side, are stored all the dishes. Thus two or three steps bring the dishes to the table, and from it to the sink and shelves. The sink to be of marble, with plated cocks to furnish hot and cold water. Nice small mops for washing dishes hung over the sink, and a convenient contrivance for drying towels over the stove.

The stove is placed between the dish and cooking closet, inclosed by partitions to the wall, with rising or sliding doors. A sliding closet, D W, to raise wood and coal from the cellar. Thus the stove can be entirely open in cold weather, and in the warm season closed tight with a contrivance to carry off the hot air and the smells of cooking into a ventilating flue.* In warm weather the stove is used for baking by moving the sliding-door, to be immediately closed after using the oven. These sliding partitions or doors, hung like windows, are made of wood, and lined with tin next the stove. By this arrangement when the folding-doors of the Family Room are open there is a large and airy room for work-hours, and every article and utensil close at hand. When work is over and the folding-doors closed the room is a cheerful sitting-room for the family. It is furnished with a cheerful green carpet, and the appended work-closets are covered with a light green oil-cloth to match the carpet. On one side is a closet, for china, glass, and silver, with a small sink for washing them. In two corners are niches for busts and flowers, with small closets under them for working conveniences. A fire-place and mantle ornaments tempt the family gathering around the social hearth. The room opens to the piazza by sliding-doors. Glass roof and partitions in winter can turn this into a green-house, warmed by a register. On one side is a recess for a piano. This and the adjacent room to have deadened walls, so that the mother, if weary or ill, can find perfect quiet in the Home Room below or the Library above. The wearisome practicing of children on a piano will be thus escaped.

The stationary dining-table has appendages and conveniences under it, as do the ottomans with lids, which serve to store newspapers and

In these drawings there are no arrangements to secure

perfect ventilation, besides the open fire-places in every room, except the two small chambers. The securing perfectly pure air in all rooms in a house, at all seasons, is the most difficult problem of the family state. A separate article will be devoted to this object hereafter, in which drawings to illustrate this method of escaping the heat and smells of cooking will appear.

other matters. By such arrangements many steps are saved and order promoted. The covers of the sofa, ottomans, and table, and the wall-paper should match in color and design with the carpet, as also the window-shades. Such arrangements as these save the labor and expense of separate kitchen and dining-room, and also the expense of wasteful domestics. In such a house parents could train their children to be their happy associates in both work and play.

The West Room is specially for parents and children, and is named the Home Room. On the north is a bed recess concealed by foldingdoors or curtains. On one side is the parents' dressing-room, with drawers on one side to the ceiling, and a clothes-press. The other side is the children's room, with drawers and clothespress, close to the bath and water-closet and back outside door, so that children can run out and in without using other parts of the house. On one side of the back-door is a closet for garden tools and shoes, and on the other side a wash-bowl and towel, with a towel closet at hand, near both to this and to the bath-room.

The Home Room opens to a south conservatory and small fountain. Here parents can train their children to love and rear flowers, not for themselves alone, but for those who are less favored. Every child can not only give flowers to friends, but save seeds to give to some poor children, and teach them how to adorn their own homes with such blossoms of love and beauty. A sofa recess is in this room, and two niches in the opposite corners with work-closets under, while the centre-table and ottomans are provided with hidden places for storing conveniences. The bed recess and dressing-rooms are so provided with drawers and closets, reaching to the wall, that every article needed by parents and children may be stored close at hand. Windows in each division, and openings over partitions, secure ventilation.

At night, the parents and two little ones have a large and airy bedroom. In the day, these doors being closed, the same room is a nursery or a parlor at pleasure.

The carpet, wall-paper, covers of furniture, and window-shades, all are in harmony—blue and buff, or white and green, or gray and pink, as the taste may lead.

The drawing on the top of page 715 gives the second-floor, with its dormer-windows and balconies, the roof being so contrived that a current of air passes between the walls of the chambers and the roof, preventing excessive heat in summer. There are five good sized bedrooms, each with a closet. The largest can be finished with an arched ceiling, and furnished as a drawingroom and library, where parents and guests can A retire from the work and children below. method of deadening the walls also is provided, so that the noise of one room will not pass to the others.

A ventilating flue may be made, with a current of warm air from the stove in summer, and

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CLOSET

CHAMBER.

CLOSET.

CHAMBER. 12X18.5

PASSAGE.

BATH R.

BATH R.

HALL.

PARLOR AND LIBRARY.

18.5 X22.

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the furnace and stove in winter, and connected with every room, securing perfect ventilation, without care and in spite of false notions, in all seasons, and by day and night. Fire-places in every room but two give these sources of comfort and health.

There is only one stair-case, with a broad stair and two landings; to which, by giving up a closet below, may be added a narrow stair from the broad stair to the back-door, under the narrow stairway to the garret. There are two bath-rooms and a water-closet, with easy access from the chambers. In the country water can be gathered on the roof, or raised by a forcing-pump to a reservoir in the garret, for the use of the water-closet.

The annexed drawing gives the cellar, with its white plastered walls and hard water-cement floor. The south front portion is fitted up with tubs for a laundry and drying-room, having windows admitting sun and air. Should it be wanted for a kitchen, the cellar should be extended under the veranda, arches being used to support the wall of the room above. The windows of thick glass placed in the floor of the veranda would admit sunlight, and if made to rise would also admit air. The ontside door to this room

also could be made of glass to admit light.

The north part receives the wood and coal, and a sliding closet, DW,

BALCONY.

CLOSET,

BALCONY.

close to the stove, filled once a day, and easily raised (like a dumb-waiter), supplies fuel with little labor. A room is parted off for vegetables that should be shut out from the light and warmth of the furnace, a safe being close to the cellar stairs, and a form raised close by these stairs to hold articles to be kept in a cellar, which save steps and waste.

All the inner wood-work to be combinations of chestnut, walnut, white wood, black walnut, or pine-oiled or varnished.

The engraving which heads this article gives a perspective view of the house and grounds, with trees, etc. The trees are in a thick shade near the house, but not so as to shut out clump, to make a dense the sun from all parts of the roof.

A house on this plan will accommodate a family of ten, and afford also a guest-chamber, and it offers all the conveniences and comforts and most of the elegances of houses that cost four times the amount and require three or four servants.

If a new-married pair commence housekeeping in it, the young wife, aided by a girl of ten or twelve, could easily perform all the labor except the washing and ironing, which could be done by hired labor in the basement. The first months of housekeeping could be spent in perfecting herself and her assistant, whom she could train to do all kinds of family work, and

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PLAN OF CELLAR.

There have been various attempts made to form communities on various modifications of the Fourierite plan, which brings individuals of all ages, tastes, and habits into one family, with no parents or superior or bishop to control. Such are, and ever must be, failures.

also to be her intelligent and sympathizing help- | with its simple and natural duties, where two, er when children come. united in love, or sometimes the widowed one While it should be the aim to render woman's alone, has an independent home and a small profession so honorable that persons of the high-flock all under her own control, with none but est position and culture will seek it, as men seek God and her own conscience to rule. their most honored professions, there must still be the class of servants, to carry out a style of living and expenditure both lawful and useful, where large fortunes abound. For this class the aim should be to secure their thorough preparation and to increase their advantages. Should both aims be achieved, then a woman who prefers a style of living demanding servants, will be so trained herself as not to be dependent on hirelings at the sacrifice of self-respect. On the other hand, a woman who chooses another style of living, so as to work herself and train her children to work, can do so without fear of losing any social advantages. Or, in case more helpers are needed, she can secure highly cultivated and refined friends to share all her family enjoyments, instead of depending on a class inferior in cultivation and less qualified to form the habits and tastes of her children.

But it is not the married alone who are privileged to become ministers in the home church of Jesus Christ. A woman without children, and with means of her own, could provide such a house as this, and take one child and a wellqualified governess to aid in training it. Then, after success inspires confidence, a second child might be adopted till the extent of her means and benevolence is reached.

There are multitudes of benevolent women, whose cultivated energies are now spent in a round of selfish indulgence, who would wake up to a new life if they thus met woman's highest calling as Heaven-appointed ministers of Christ, to train his neglected little ones for that kingdom of self-denying labor and love of which he is the model and head.

Thousands and thousands of orphans are now deprived of a father's home and support. Thousands of women, widowed in the dearest hopes of this life, are seeking for consolation in the only

true avenues.

A great emergency in our nation has occurred, in which thousands of women are forever

So the boarding-school system, which takes children from parental love and close watch of the family state, giving them to strangers amidst new and multiplied temptations, this is, and ever must be, a failure.

The true Protestant system, yet to be developed and tried by women of wealth and benevolence, is the one here suggested; based not on the conventual, nor on the Fourierite, nor on the boarding-school systems, but on the Heavendevised plan of the family state.

One aim of this article is to attract the notice of conscientious persons commencing the family state with means sufficient for a much more expensive establishment.

Many such really believe themselves the followers of Christ who have seldom practiced that economy which denies self to increase the advantages of the poor, especially in deciding on the style of living they adopt. Most wealthy persons provide houses, equipage, servants, and expenditures that demand most of their income, while the waste in their kitchens alone would, by careful economy, such as we see in France, feed another whole family.

When houses are built on Christian and democratic principles, and young girls in every condition of life are trained to a wise economy, thousands of young men, who can not afford to marry young ladies trained in the common boarding-school fashion, will find the chief impediment removed; and thus healthful and happy homes will multiply with our increasing wealth and culture.

cut off from any homes of their own by marriage. I

Of these many are women of wealth and influence among Protestants, who in hospitals and battle-fields have been learning the highest lessons of self-sacrificing benevolence. Such will not return home to be idle, but will press toward those avenues that offer the most aid and sympathy; and if it is not provided by Protestants they will seek it in the Catholic fold.

Catholic convents provide their inmates with a comfortable home and opportunities of benevolence toward neglected children, the sick, and the poor. But they are burdened with a round of observances and rules involving the sacrifice of reason and conscience, and of personal independence. For complete submission to the Superior is the first duty. Moreover, this is not the family state designed by God,

FRANKLIN'S TAN.

AM now at liberty to tell a story I have ached to tell for years.

My mother prepared me for college, and at sixteen I was ready for Yale. Our arrangements were all completed, and my father had satisfied himself that they were the best that could be made, when he received a letter from a friend, who took that means of announcing his failure in business. The failure involved my father in ruin-he had signed paper for Franklin to an amount that was startling to think of. In giving and in using confidence they had acted like two crazy men.

Ruin is a little word to write, but a great load to walk under. It is not a pleasant recollection, still I would not lose my remembrance of what passed under our roof the night on which that letter was received.

God

I can see my father as he sat there in the li- | wish to live, but I shall die if I go back. brary of the old-fashioned stone-house we had taken for the summer. The letter was addressed to him at Tappan, and had been waiting for him all day, while he was hard at work in his city office. It was written by Mr. Franklin himself. It said that he had made a great experiment in business, and had failed, and that he was a bankrupt. He made no effort to gloss over or abate the fact, but stated it in so many round words. There it was-he was ruined. He didn't intend to stay ruined, however. He was going to begin again-he hoped never to rest until he had recovered what was lost; and, principal and interest, the debt of honor owing to his dear friend Hageman should be paid. My father, he said, was almost his only creditor; and though it distracted him to think of the injury he might have inflicted upon him, still he should live by his determination to right all this mischief and evil.

has said the days of the man who honors his father and mother shall be long in the land. I do not deserve to be a martyr, nor to make martyrs of you."

I carried that point. And so I am not learned. School-boys in these days would find it easy enough to trip me up; but God knew what was best, and He made us all see it. He has given me a full cup, pressed down, and running over. I have missed brilliant success, barely possible perhaps, but nearly probable to every youth that lives; and, comparing my own quiet fortunes with some more splendid and honorable in the world's view, I am quietly content.

His side of the business seemed brave and honorable enough. As to our side, if friendship failed to serve us a great turn now, it would fail of a glorious opportunity.

But this is not the story I have desired to tell for years.

I had been in business with my father for some time, and we had found a great deal of up-hill work to do-little, indeed, besides; were living, in fact, as you might say, from hand to mouth, but with a near prospect of a better state of things-we always kept that prospect in view -when, one day, we were astonished by a letter from Jacob Franklin, inclosing a check for the amount of his debt, together with the interest, which also dated from the time of his failure! Never was money so unlooked-for; never could it have been more welcome. We re

My mother was the first to say, when my father had been surprised into letting us know the contents of the letter, "Jacob will do all he promises." And that was a heroic speech for her to make, for Franklin was my father's friend, not hers. I mean by that he was hers only by adop-ceived it as from God. Adversity had not tion, though he might naturally enough have been hers by election also. There was sufficient confidence and sympathy between them for that. I can see yet the look my father gave her when he said, "Yes, Harriet; that is true. He will do all he promises if he only lives."

greatly harmed us; what would prosperity do? I say adversity had not greatly harmed us, and by that I mean it had not soured my father's heart, though his hair had grown gray and his countenance very grave in the stern fight he had kept up with poverty for ten long years. It had not daunted my mother's faith; but it had been able to write some lines on her face which told of solemn struggles and of hardwon victories.

I never gave them any peace till the ocean rolled between us, after Franklin's letter came. Rest and change of scene and of life would make them young again, the doctor told them and me. So it was accomplished, and that experience was to all of us the nearest exemplification of miracle we shall ever be likely to know.

"He will live," said my mother. She had that way of speaking. She had the clearest, most decided convictions of any person I ever met. She held by Providence, and believed in Destiny. I used to consider her promises, which certainly were not intended for oracular utterances, as words of authority, to be received with simple faith-action, of course, to be in accordance. She had the power of seeing through things as we see stars through the auroral cloud. Later in the evening I perceived my parents were looking at me in a way that made me get After they had sailed, that same week, I packup and leave the room. I went out of that he- ed my portmanteau and set out on a pilgrimage. roic atmosphere like a coward; for I saw, well I had all along regarded Jacob Franklin as someenough, that their chief thought in their trouble thing less than honorable, if any thing less than concerned me. I said to myself, when I walked base. Now I wanted to express to him gratiout into the garden, "I never will go to Yale. tude for more than the restitution he had made I will learn business, and stand by father. After for justifying the faith my father had always I graduated I should have to get a profession-preserved in him. if I were older I could pay my way-but who would hire me as a tutor? Four or five years from now I might hope to support myself, if I should go to college-not before. No, no."

But those "angels in the house" decreed otherwise. I was obliged to yield. I yielded for three months. Then I went back home. When I got there I found why I had returned. There was no hiding the fact that they were in a hot furnace of afflictions. I said to them, "I

I was never more surprised in my life than by my drive through the crooked street of Little Carrington. Franklin's reputation and his letter had led me to suppose that his works would justify and repay the visit of a stranger, and as such I presented myself at the gate of his factory-yard. But such an odd jumble of sheds and mean wooden buildings as were congregated within the stakes and fences which inclosed his works! I was so surprised at the

broken-down appearance of the place that I asked the first man I met on the grounds if there was any mistake; hadn't the lad who undertook to be my guide misunderstood me? I wanted to see Mr. Jacob Franklin and his tannery.

said Joshua, taking off his old straw-hat and wiping his forehead, over which a continuous stream of perspiration was flowing. "I came near going off bodily that time."

We had climbed to the top of South Mountain and sat there, looking down on a scene the

The person I addressed was a little, dark-like of which you will not discover if you go faced, Spanish-looking fellow. He answered, with a smile, that I could see the works; but as to Mr. Franklin, he was not at home, and wouldn't be for a month yet. But if I had any business, he was Joshua Crowe. It took half an hour for him and me to understand each other. But in that time the work of years had been accomplished, and we were intimate.

from one end of the world to the other, in all probability. I supposed he referred to some slip somewhere; for I had just drawn him up by the shoulders through a break in the rocks, I believe they call it the "Lemon Squeezer," and the expedients to which there was need of resorting in his behalf might remind that man of much experiment of no doubt many an extreme and perilous experience. But looking at him for further explanation, I saw him with his left

After he had shown me about the works and the town a mere dependency-he had his team brought round, and we drove among the mount-hand extended looking at it. He held it up beains. fore me.

I had said, "The works are not exactly such as I expected to see." He had answered, "Because there was one thing Jacob would attend to before he made any repairs, except such as were absolutely necessary to carrying on operations. We are going to begin at the new buildings this fall; the machinery is all ordered. Next year there will be a tannery in the country which will do all the business worth the doing. FRANKLIN and Crowe's."

"But what was it that made him put off building so long?" I asked, perfectly aware of the answer I'd have.

"When I lost those fingers," said he, "it was a miracle I didn't lose my whole body. Frozen, you see. But if any of us had known any thing I shouldn't have lost the fingers."

"Be so good as to tell me what there is in this August heat to remind a man of freezing,” said I.

"It's a long yarn," he answered.

"If I get tired I can count the farms in the valley. Are those the Berkshire hills over there, eighty miles away?"

"Berkshire hills," said he, with dreamy affirmation. Then he roused up: "I'll tell you. We

"The debt owing your father," said Crowe. were in the very thick of the heaviest business And I blushed.

Our talk all the way was less of scenery than you might suppose it would be, seeing I was for the first time in my life among the mountains. But I doubt whether either of us failed to see the glorious beauty of those folding hills, or the glow of great fields of golden rod and purple aster, under a heaven of the deepest blue. There were secret things and facts, which science knew and was revealing, more fascinating than this visible beauty of nature.

that was done in this part of the country, when a man came to Carrington who was an old college friend of Jacob's. He had known him there as the most brilliant student of the class or the college. He was, in fact, a glittering fellow. We showed him over the works, and he got very much interested in the business. Well, he was a plausible fellow, he was. Had a way of telling a thing that wasn't within a gun-shot of truth as if it were gospel, and he had a theory that set Jacob wild. Lord a' mercy! He had a theory about every thing. And so he had to fit one for tanning, though you know he didn't know any more than a babe about the business when he set foot in Carrington-but then he was a philosopher.

David, the king, knew a great deal, and was fully alive to all he knew-perhaps no man in this day of living men much more alive. But when I think of this great American continent, such a vast mine of treasure, a land full of riches, I wish that he had known of it and the glory "Now, young fellow, you needn't think beGod has given it. What would he have thought cause I'm a hard-working practical man, and of our gold mines and silver mines, our mount- speak that way about science and philosophy, ains of ore, our lakes, seas, and rivers of oil, that I despise them. I think, as sure as time our unfathomed beds of coal? "O Lord!" he rolls on, the world will all be in the hands of said, "the earth is full of Thy riches; so is the science, and philosophy will have the great great wide sea." But I wish that he and Solo-throne among temporals. I mean scientific phimon could have emigrated to America out of losophy. I'm not afraid of that, or of God being poor little Judea. Forgive me, oh world! We dethroned by his glorious ministers and servants are to-day looking to the end of our great strug--no danger! What I'm powerfully afraid of gle; we are looking to the future of this nation, is your dabbler and theorist, who isn't afraid, and the heart of the country is almost breaking who's positive before he thinks his way clear with gladness. Yea, it behooves us to say little through a thing, and has proved his right to of the glory of man, but all things, all things, theory by successful practice. indeed, of the greatness, of the riches, of the glory of God.

"Well, as I said, he looked into our affairs, asked a good many questions, and began to say "This reminds me of the day that happened," what a wonderful good thing it would be if a

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