BEAUTIFUL HOMES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2396, 1 February 1900, Page 55

BEAUTIFUL HOMES.

" Wherever a true wife comes," the recently-deceased Ruskin tells us in his ■' Sesame and Lilies," " home is always around her." . . . The path of a good woman is indeed strewn with flowers ; but they rise behind her steps, not before them. 'Her feet have touched the meadows and left the daisies rosy. ' " He is speaking chiefly of spiritual influence, but the spirit loves to express itself in material forms, and his words suggest a guiding principle not only for conduct, but also for such details as architecture, the grouping of flowers and trees, the furnishing and adorning of " the temple watched over by the household gods.'' We all know that Ruskin would have that temple the ideal expression of its queen's nature, not of her faults and vices, but her aspirations after loveliness and truth to Nature. There are other considerations besides beauty — health and comfort especially — but there is a tendency now to think more of these and less and less of what is delightful to the eye. Yet no training at schools of art, no visits to foreign picture galleries can so form the mind as our daily environment. "There was a child went forth, and all that he looked on became part of him."

It is not only " the beauty born of murmuring sound " that passes into the face — it is the refined grace and simplicity of all that is seen clay by day that enters into our manner, our thoughts and feelings, and shows itself in the expression of our features. . And a really artistic home is not only a source of enjoyment to its owners and to the little children whose infant eyes are first attracted by its pictures and its flowers ; it is an artistic possession of the city that it stands in quite as much as a fine picture in the art gallery or a flower bed laid out bj- a beautifying society. Every street wayfarer, every stranger, may enjoy the soft or deep warm colouring of its roof and walls, its quaint alcoves and gables, its pleasure grounds and winding paths, the perfume of its lilacs in the spring, and the autumn splendour of its chrysanthemums. The man or woman who makes one garden j)lot, if it be but a strip of ground among the barren wilderness of flowerless town mansions or shops and hovels, is a public benefactor. We can hardly think of beautiful homes without flowers : they so far excel all other ornaments, and they cost the least of all. But, unfortunately, expense and beauty have no necessary connection. To realise this, we have only to wander through streets of " fine " town houses nearly all on the same model, some quite square, and others tricked out like a birthday cake, and then to get away intc some lowly suburb and see the pretty little cottages all overgrown with jasmine or the climbing rose, half hidden in a bower of orchard green and willows, with the wild grass plots below sweet with stocks and sweet pea and carnations. In one of the ugliest streets of Christchurch, among stable yards and dirty huts, stands a quaint little vintage that any stranger might pause to tool: . t. with a sudden surprised delight. !t i 1 - <mU ° little four-roomed wooden place, .uid his i,.m oven a verandah, but the flatii <>i ii' iroi'L is relieved by a trellis l"i<li | micil i.en <nd covered with sweet 'Wivi-pvi .^ (-I,'cpeis Tlifre are projecting lui'ts — Mo'liii' Ui't b't< i)t corrugawd iron iiui'Wl . ni Ji' i'-d(l vi hnrui over the old-i^-luoned v. n<.]ov"-. \iliu-h open ii',l"*- upon the rind cmnuu, . |iiniit«. ie<tci' up to them. ''"'ircu^h hf-o f •vuimloa,doors, di tict i'c ri-id" with a\l>hc; ] n,v ciutains, on sunv'.t" (Vinin^ there t- a glimpse of just •-ucli i Mmplo. piet'A interior as one would < xjv I Tho'e is scarcely moi'e than one-( i^lit'i <>i <m acib in front of the door, but t\iw niHi of n is blossoming or bearing fruit aiter n-, kind There is a tiny arbour oi trellis woik wit 1 white jasmine in bloom. There are io t of scarlet runners flowering brightly, groupof gay poppies and tall stems of pink huihhocks, double stocks. ro«es", and carnalxnis, the whole making a brilliant colour etiVcf, with a look about it rather uncolonit'l We gue^ something of the owners of th^ cmtage ; we know at least they iovp lli-ir home, and that they have discoveu-d oi'e of the purest, simplest, healthiest T>ys m life We may laugh at the prosj old Pioiali^t > account of the reprobate : ] passed by his garden and a?\\ ilic wild Im.'i The thorn and Uie thistle nuum hi i>oi iuml

higher. But there is a good di il in it alter a'l. Did you ever notice lmw \en few iraideiiers commit crimes '' 1 \vj h we lv.d m>m3 statistics.

What iw true of tl 1 " i mmim' o!" <i house is also true of tin i"-ii'"V, \> ai'ty is never a tiling thai i^ leu*. In and sold But it is tine that in iJrj (■ w> ->\ . i,ir<V see a piclurcßCjUrf cuUa^'t 10.-it X, v .■ they are i;enei\tUv iillcd a ith il>. ii t ■ i .piM'iuis i.t rich people"*, fur n .'i.. !)i i ii Ibe <-i>untry the lcitohen v/*< ' i'- \\><.k . j.cu !':i pluce and its vva] crock erv il oil en in^- attractive than

the large drawing rooms of the rich, stuffed full of costly draperies, carpets, and rugs, and crowded with heterogeneous ornaments. Of the two there is no doubt which an artist would prefer painting. Not, indeed, that a drawing room may not be made most artistic ; only it is entirely a question of taste, not of money.

The character of the surroundings has a great deal to do with the appearance of either cottage or mansion. With hilly ground one can do wonders, and this is the greatest charm of Dunedin buildings. Yet even hillsides are abused, and the eye is caiight by a conspicuous backyard, treeless and unashamed, completely destroying all view of the house ; or else some bald square structure is stuck on top of a mound ■with the slope in front laid out in ribbon garden beds and clipped green grass. One of the doctor's houses in Wellington gives a good idea of what can be done in steep places. The land had been quite an eyesore, with shabby, clingy houses and backyards ; but the " queen of the garden" had them cleared away, and her new house built far back from the street in something of the Swiss style, with a large pleasant loggia, while the rough slopes in front were covered with shrubs and conifers. The result was quite a transformation scene. The most picturesque dwelling-place I have ever .seen is a " T3i*olese " villa on a .hill in the suburbs. The design was copied from a photograph, and the building was supervised by the owners. The colour of room and walls is a shaded deep brown and red, and of course it has the peaked gables, the alcove balcony, and the railed verandah Aye are familiar with in Alpine paintings. The feature of the interior is the one long room — a perfect picture, as I first saw it, its latticed windows opening outward with a wide view over sea and valley ; and in the ledges glasses of single yellow daffodils. Both these houses belong to people who have travelled, and are on foreign models ; but even our own colonial style his a great charm about it. lam thinking of the early Australian and New Zealand farmhouses, with their French windoAvs and their odd nooks, low ceilings, white-washed hearths, and little cosy bedrooms opening one on to another. In Australia they are prettier than here, for there you generally see the wide verandah all round the front and sides, and all overgrown with vines ov a brilliant subtropical creeper. Lately runholders have taken more and more to stiff, grand, modern residences. They are more comfortable, no doubt, but we feel a pang of regret for the old farmhouse style. Comfort is a good thing, but loveliness, too, is a necessity of our higher nature ; and it is generally 'possible to combine the two. So, like floberL Buchanan, " I end where I began,"' with the thought that a beautiful home, great or small, is a source of constant pleasure, and has a refining influence on all who chance to &cc it.