[Illustration: MENNOYER DRAWINGS AND OLD MIRRORS SET IN PANELINGS]
And so we women have achieved a house, luminous with kind purpose
throughout. It is finished--that is our difficulty! We inherit it, all
rounded in its perfection, consummate in its charms, but it is finished,
and what can we do about a thing that is finished I Doesn't it seem that
we are back in the old position of Isabella d'Este--eager, predatory,
and "thingy"? And isn't it time for us to pull up short lest we
sidestep the goal? We are so sure of a thousand appetites we are in
danger of passing by the amiable commonplaces. We find ourselves
dismayed in old houses that look too simple. We must stop and ask
ourselves questions, and, if necessary, plan for ourselves little
retreats until we can find ourselves again.
What is the goal? A house that is like the life that goes on within it,
a house that gives us beauty as we understand it--and beauty of a nobler
kind that we may grow to understand, a house that _looks_ amenity.
Suppose you have obtained this sort of wisdom--a sane viewpoint. I think
it will give you as great a satisfaction to re-arrange your house with
what you have as to re-build, re-decorate. The results may not be so
charming, but you can learn by them. You can take your indiscriminate
inheritance of Victorian rosewood of Eastlake walnut and cocobolo, your
pickle-and-plum colored Morris furniture, and make a civilized interior
by placing it right, and putting detail at the right points.
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