conventional bouquet of flowers in a flat frame the color of the furniture, with the watermelon color of the curtains predominating in a neutral tint background.  The table is set with a rather coarse cream-colored linen drawn-work centerpiece (a tea cloth actually) big enough to cover all but three inches of table edge.  In the middle of the table is a glass bowl with a wide turn-over rim, holding deep pink flowers (roses or tulips) standing upright in glass flower holders as though growing.  In midwinter, when real flowers are too expensive, porcelain ones take their place—­unless there is a lunch or dinner party.  The compotiers are glass urns and the only pieces of silver used are two tall Sheffield candelabra at night, without shades, the salts and peppers and the necessary spoons and forks.  The knives are “ivory” handled.

=SETTING THE TABLE=

Everything on the table must be geometrically spaced; the centerpiece in the actual center, the “places” at equal distances, and all utensils balanced; beyond this one rule you may set your table as you choose.

If the tablecloth is of white damask, which for dinner is always good style, a “felt” must be put under it. (To say that it must be smooth and white, in other words perfectly laundered, is as beside the mark as to say that faces and hands should be clean!) If the tablecloth has lace insertions, it must on no account be put over satin or over a color.  In a very “important” dining-room and on a very large table, a cloth of plain and finest quality damask with no trimming other than a monogram (or crest) embroidered on either side, is in better taste than one of linen with elaborations of lace and embroidery.  Damask is the old-fashioned but essentially conservative (and safely best style) tablecloth, especially, suitable in a high-ceilinged room that is either English, French, or of no special period, in decoration.  Lace tablecloths are better suited to an Italian room—­especially if the table is a refectory one.  Handkerchief linen tablecloths embroidered and lace-inserted are also, strangely enough, suited to all quaint, low-ceilinged, old-fashioned but beautifully appointed rooms; the reason being that the lace cloth is put over a bare table.  The lace cloth must also go over a refectory table without felt or other lining.

Very high-studded rooms (unless Italian) on the other hand, seem to need the thickness of damask.  To be sure, one does see in certain houses—­at the Gildings’ for instance—­an elaborate lace and embroidery tablecloth put on top of a plain one which in turn goes over a felt, but this combination is always somewhat overpowering, whereas lace over a bare table is light and fragile.

Another thing—­very ornate, large, and arabesqued designs, no matter how marvellous as examples of workmanship, inevitably produce a vulgar effect.

All needlework, whether to be used on the table or on a bed, must, in a beautifully finished house, be fine rather than striking.  Coarse linen, coarse embroideries, all sorts of Russian drawn-work, Italian needlework or mosaic (but avoiding big scrolled patterns), are in perfect keeping—­and therefore in good taste—­in a cottage, a bungalow or a house whose furnishings are not too fine.