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House Furnishing and Decorating: Matting

Straw Matting.-When purchasing straw matting it is advisable to buy the best grade of fine white or unfigured matting for all rooms alike; thus as it wears out it can be readily matched or replaced by putting good matting from two rooms together in one.

Matting Rugs. - Cut suitable lengths of matting and hem with twine string for use as summer rugs. Two or more breadths may be attached together if desired to make wide rugs. Use plain, or apply paint, or stain of any desired color. A large square rug can be made in this way to occupy the center of the floor, a border being made by painting or staining the floor, or covering with green denim or drugget. Rag Rugs. Very durable and useful rugs may be made of all sorts of carpet, or by braiding, or they may be old rags in the same fashion as a rag knitted or drawn through burlap or canvas as in embroidery. Small pieces may be utilized by commencing at one side and cutting the width of a carpet rug almost to the end, then turning a corner and cutting along the side, and so going around the outside until the piece is cut up. After clipping off the square corners the rag will be found to be of convenient length. Carpet rags should be wound into balls of uniform size. They catch less dust, and do not become tangled. ing bee, or run them up on the sewing When ready to tack them, have a sewmachine. This will enable you to do them very quickly.

Old stocking legs make especially pretty rugs.

To Make Drawn Rugs.-First prepare a frame by nailing together four pieces of lathe or other light pine stuff, and stretch on this a piece of strong burlap or coarse canvas. Prepare the rags by cutting them in a uniform width of one half inch or less, and wind each color in a separate ball.

Draw the rags through the burlap by means of a hook, that can be extemporized from a piece of wire. Insert the hook from above between the warp and woof of the burlap, and draw the loops projecting at uniform heights rag up from below so as to form above the burlap. This is the principle upon which Axminster carpet is made. A design may be traced on the burlap by means of chalk or charcoal, and the outlines drawn with two or three rows of rags in different col- A little experience will indicate how closely together to draw the loops, which should project a half inch or loops may afterwards be clipped, as less above the burlap. If desired, the ors.

HOUSE FURNISHING AND DECORATING is done with the Wilton carpets, by means of a sharp pair of scissors.

CURTAINS, SHADES, AND DRAPERIES The use of curtains originated before the invention of glass, when windows were either open or imperfectly protected against draughts.

They originally hung straight down across the sash.

At present the object of window shades and curtains is primarily to regulate the amount of light in the room, and to screen the interior, when desired, from observation from without. It is a prime rule of good taste in decoration that it must not be allowed to interfere with the purpose for which a thing is intended. Hence curtains and draperies that cannot be drawn aside to admit the light, or let fall to exclude it, are objectionable.