chest of drawers, and a couple of yards of bedside carpet.  The two youngest children sleep in this room, and three or four others in the second bedroom, where the bedsteads are less showy and the ware very inferior.  The carpet is replaced by china matting.  The chest of drawers does duty as a toilet-table, and there are of course no such luxuries as towel-horses.  Yet, take it all in all, Chips has much to be thankful for.

With labour so dear as it is here, it is wonderful to think that a working-man can furnish, and furnish comfortably, a four-roomed cottage for L27; and yet this is what has recently been done in Melbourne by my friend Hornyhand, who is a common labourer, earning only eight to nine shillings a day, and paying about as much a week for rent.  He is really uncommonly well off, everything in his house being brand-new; and yet, as he tells me, he is absolutely at the root of the honest social tree—­the worst paid of the working-classes.  I think it worth while to subjoin his bill.  He certainly has not gone in for luxuries, but then he is of a frugal mind.  If he wanted it, his house could be as well furnished as Chips’; but he doesn’t see any object in wasting money on that kind of thing, and is content with little: 

Parlour.  L s. d.

Cedar polished couch, covered with horse-hair 2 10 0
Four cane-seat chairs, each 7s. 6d. 1 10 0
Cedar polished table, 3 ft. 6 in., on claws 1 10 0
Maple rocking-chair, with elbows 0 17 6
Carpet 1 5 0
Hearthrug, 8s. 6d. fender, 9s. irons, 6s. 6d. 1 4 0

Bedroom.

French bedstead, 4 ft. 6 in. by 6 ft. 6 in. 1 15 0
Pair paillasses 12 6
Woollen flock mattrass 1 0 0
Woollen flock bolster and 2 pillows 8 0
Washstand, and rail attached 10 6
Toilet table, to match 10 6
Toilet glass, 14 in. by 10 in. 8 6
2 cane-scat chairs (Albert), 6s. each 12 0
4 yards matting at 9d. 3 0
Toilet-ware, six pieces 12 6

Second Bedroom.

2 French bedsteads, 3 ft. by 6 ft. 6 in. at 30s. 3 0 0 4 paillasses, at 10s. per pair 1 0 0 2 woollen flock mattrasses, at 16. 3d. each 1 12 6 2 bolsters, flock, at 4s. 6d. each 9 0 2 pillows, flock, at 3s. each 6 0 Toilet chest of drawers (to serve for toilet table), cedar 2 5 0 Toilet glass, 14 in. by 10 in. 7 0 Washstand, 2 ft. 6 in. 12 0 Wash, etc., 6 pieces 12 6

Kitchen.

Deal table, turned legs, varnished 10 6
2 wood chairs, each 4s. 6d. 9 0
Safe in Kauri pine 10 6
Pasteboard and rolling-pin 4 0