Accepting this doctrine, which cannot be too often or too strongly urged, although it is not new,—­indeed, it is old as the universe,—­you will, I think, be puzzled to find an excuse for yourself if you disfigure a charming landscape or a village street by an uncouth building.  Build plainly if you will, cheaply if you must, but, by all that is fair to look upon or pleasant to the thought, be honest.  It will require some study and much courage, but verily you will have your reward, and I for one shall be proud to write myself your admiring friend.

LETTER IV.

From John.

Professional folly.

My Dear Architect:  I’ve been trying to learn my “first grand lesson,” as laid down in your second epistle to yours truly.  About all I can make of it is:  Firstly, that my house is for myself to live in,—­wife and babies included,—­not for my neighbors to look at; and, secondly, that however much I may try to humbug my fellow-sinners in other ways, I’m not to build a lie into my house, where it is sure to be found out, after I’m dead and gone, if not before.

You wonder what my opinion is of architects.  Well, without being personal, I’m free to maintain that as a rule I’m afraid of ’em.  The truth is, they don’t care what a fellow’s house costs him, whatever they may say in the beginning; and I never knew a man to build from an architect’s plans that his bills didn’t come in just about double what he laid out for.  They want to get up a grand display, if it’s a possible thing, so everybody that comes along will stop and say, “What a charming house!  Who made the plans?” while from beginning to end it may be all for show and nothing for use, and mortgaged to the very chimney-tops.  That’s my opinion, and I’m not alone in it, either.

There was my neighbor down the road,—­he wanted a commonish kind of a house.  Nothing would do but his wife must have it planned by a “professional” man.  Result was, she had to put her best bedstead square in the middle of the room, and there was no possible place for the sitting-room lounge but to stand it on end behind a door in the corner.  Another acquaintance of mine had $5,000.  Didn’t want to spend a cent more than that.  Called on an architect,—­may have been you, for all I know; architect made sketches, added here a little and there a good deal, made one or two rooms a few feet bigger, poked the roof up several feet higher, and piled the agony on to the outside, until, when the thing was done, it cost him $11,000!  Of course it ran him into debt, and most likely will be sold at auction.  He’ll never get what it cost him, unless he can sell it as we boys used to swap wallets,—­without looking at the inside.  But everybody says it’s “lovely,” and wants to know who was his architect.

That, I expect, is just where the shoe pinches.  If an architect can only make a fine show with another man’s money, he gets a reputation in no time; but if he has a little conscience, and tries to plan a house that can be built for a given sum, every one says it looks cheap, no kind of taste, and very likely the owner himself is grouty about it, and next time goes for another man.