XVI
THE SMALL APARTMENT
This is the age of the apartment. Not only in the great cities, but in
the smaller centers of civilization the apartment has come to stay.
Modern women demand simplified living, and the apartment reduces the
mechanical business of living to its lowest terms. A decade ago the
apartment was considered a sorry makeshift in America, though it has
been successful abroad for more years than you would believe. We
Americans have been accustomed to so much space about us that it seemed
a curtailment of family dignity to give up our gardens, our piazzas and
halls, our cellars and attics, our front and rear entrances. Now we are
wiser. We have just so much time, so much money and so much strength,
and it behooves us to make the best of it. Why should we give our time
and strength and enthusiasm to drudgery, when our housework were better
and more economically done by machinery and co-operation? Why should we
stultify our minds with doing the same things thousands of times over,
when we might help ourselves and our friends to happiness by intelligent
occupations and amusements? The apartment is the solution of the living
problems of the city, and it has been a direct influence on the houses
of the towns, so simplifying the small-town business of living as well.
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