opposite them the regulation white marble mantelpiece, more or less
carved, and a gilt mirror, which we will hope is not protected from the
flies by green netting. Having made a grimace, you sit down upon one of
the chairs. There are nine in the room besides the sofa--perhaps an
ottoman--and you can take your choice between the 'gent's' armchair, the
lady's low-chair, and the six high ones. If they are not in their
night-shirts you can examine the covering--usually satin or perhaps
cretonne. The pattern is unique, being, I should think, specially
manufactured for the colonial market. Bright hues prevail. Occasional
chairs have only lately been introduced, and the whole suite is in
unison, though harmony with the carpet has been overlooked, or rather
never thought of, the two things having been chosen separately, and
without any idea that it would be an improvement if they were to match.

As for the make of the chairs, they are to be found in plenty of English
middle-class drawing-rooms even now. The shape may be named the
'deformed.' The back is carved out into various contortions of a
horse-shoe, with a bar across the middle which just catches you in the
small of the back, and is a continual reproach if you venture to lean
against it. The wood of which the chairs are made is mahogany, walnut, or
cedar. The large round or oval table which stands in the middle of the
room is of the same wood, and so are the card-table, the Davenport, the
chiffonier, and that Jacob's-ladder-like what-not in the corner. In some
houses the upholsterer has stuffed the room with useless tables. Of
course there is a fender and fire-irons, and probably a black
doleful-looking grate, which during two-thirds of the year is stuffed
with paper shavings of all the colours of the rainbow and several others
which good Mother Nature forgot to put into it. On the chimney-piece is a
Louis XVI. clock and a pair of ornaments to match. A piano, tune
immaterial, is a _sine quâ non_ even in a middle-class house, but when