There are times also when the window is so small, the lighting capacity so inadequate, and the scale of the room and furniture so light that it is a mistake to have more than one pair of hangings. In an extreme case of this kind a thin net or muslin might answer the purpose. If a shade or blind is used, this should be hung within the casing.

Probably no one material is as effective in as many ways and under as varied conditions for a single curtain as what is known as English casement cloth. This is good in the country, in the town house, in the North and in the South. It is available for a moderate price and is good enough to use almost anywhere.

When one pair of curtains is used, almost without exception, these curtains should stop at the casement line. With the two pairs, the preference is for the heavy hangings to escape the floor by an inch or two. This is decorative and hygienic.

It must be borne in mind, whatever the problem is, that the right idea in hangings is of the first importance in interior decoration after the background has been determined.

It may be wise, while discussing the hangings as they relate to the window trim, to say something in regard to the treatment of wood as it is a part of the background. Wood may be considered from two points of view only: first, the natural wood, and second an artificial treatment of it.

There was a time when it was considered a sin to obscure in any way a natural grain or other unusual and ofttimes ugly marks which nature had impressed on wood. A grain had to be brought out clearly and distinctly. Besides this, it was varnished or glazed until it appeared like wood under glass. Not so many years ago we even went so far as to paint the surface of wood, imitating its colour and streaking it with fine tooth and coarse tooth combs, creating grains more grotesque and improbable than original ones could be. This insincere attempt to copy nature is the worst of all.

In any kind of wood there are beautiful and ugly pieces. The beautiful ones are the characteristic ones which are not grotesque miscarriages in nature. These woods - often beautiful in colour, charming in texture and pleasing withal - may be made ugly by any of the treatments above mentioned. Let them be treated in an oil or French finish in such a way that their salient qualities appear, their texture is in no way disturbed and their surface looks like wood, neither glass nor any other material being suggested by it. This is the proper treatment for natural wood.

Often it is impossible to arrive at decorative effects without changing materially the colour of the wood; still natural wood or unpainted wood has its place in the decorative idea. Certain methods of staining wood are successful in keying it to backgrounds which must be used if the idea of the room is not destroyed. Great care should be taken, however, that an impossible wood colour is not used if the wood is to show its grain and look natural in all but its colour. If the conventional stain is used it must in some way conventionalize the other qualities of the wood in order that they should be harmonious.

The second treatment of wood I shall call artificial. During periods in history that have reached high states of social charm, where manners, customs and life expressions were more or less artificial, it has been found necessary to do away with the grains and other natural qualities of wood in order that it, too, should express the same artificial life.

In the Baroque Renaissance gilt treatment became a craze. Fruits, vegetables, wood and persons - all were done in gilt. This necessitated the covering of wood with gold leaf that unity in treatment might obtain. The periods of Louis XIII and XIV are exuberant with artificial woods made so by the gilt treatment. During the periods of Louis XV and XVI, as well as the English periods of Hepplewhite and Adam, paint and enamel was found to be a suitable material for expressing the artificial idea.

Painted woods did not longer claim to be woods. They represented an artificial surface, structural perhaps in its form, decorative in its appearance but veiled or hidden as to its actual material. This is perfectly legitimate and when followed consistently forms one of the most attractive and most flexible treatments of wood so far as interior decoration is concerned.

A room can often be given a suitable background if an ordinary wall paper, soft and grayed in tone, is supplemented by a trim, either deep ivory white, or, better still, by a colour as nearly as possible like the wall covering. This, with a ceiling the same colour, but one shade lighter, and a floor of the same tone, but darker, is one of the most charming backgrounds imaginable for many types of modern rooms.

To consider wood as trim and not give a word to the use of wood in furniture would be to leave the subject too incomplete.

Some periods expressed themselves most clearly by leaving the wood in its natural state, or nearly so; others treated it so that the naturalistic tendency might be somewhat obscured, while in the later French and English periods the surfaces were entirely covered by gilt or enamel in order that they might be brought into closer harmony with other materials.

Even in a brief treatment of this subject one general statement may be made. In no case, excepting in very refined and artificial Georgian types, and in those Louis XV styles in which a clear and transparent surface was essential, is there reason for varnishing or glazing woods. It is not enough to know that a department store or a furniture factory has turned out pieces with a certain varnished treatment. An expert finish of wood is essential in order that the wood may take its place in the decorative scheme.

The lighting of a room is of fundamental importance in the general effect. Too much thought cannot be given to the amount of light, its kind and its distribution. In the disposal of daylight we have no present concern, but the matter of artificial lighting is of the utmost importance to every house owner and to every interior decorator. Since colour is light, without it there is no colour, and by it all colour combinations may be impaired. Since the eye sees colour only, light is the element most important in interior decorative effects.