We are a teachable and a studious people, with a faculty of turning "general information" to account; and general information upon art matters has had much to do with our good interiors.
We have, perhaps half unconsciously, applied fundamental principles to our decoration, and this may be as much owing to natural good sense as to cultivation.

We have a habit of reasoning about things, and acting upon our conclusions, instead of allowing the rest of the world to do the reasoning while we adopt the result.

It is owing to this conjunction of love for and cultivation of art, and the habit of materializing what we wish, that we have so many thoroughly successful interiors, which have been accomplished almost without aid from professional artists.

It is these, instead of the smaller number of costly interiors, which give the reputation of artistic merit to our homes.
Undoubtedly the largest proportion of successful as well as unsuccessful domestic art in our country is due to the efforts of women.
In the great race for wealth which characterizes our time, it is demanded that women shall make it effective by so using it as to distinguish the family; and nothing distinguishes it so much as the superiority of the home.

This effort adheres to small as well as large fortunes, and in fact the necessity is more pronounced in the case of mediocre than of great ones.