It is safe to say that too many such things are used in most rooms. In very luxurious ones this is almost certain to be true. There is an equal chance to overdo this matter in the cheapest kind of material. The department stores and other shops place on sale so much wildly formed, badly covered, cheaply manufactured stuff, which they call pretty, that people with a desire for beauty, and not too much taste cultivation, are quite likely to fall a prey. There can scarcely be too few pieces of ornament unless one is certain such pieces are beautiful in themselves, in harmony with the rest of the room and positively essential as a decorative note in the general scheme. With this key no one can go far astray.

There are herds of cows, droves of sheep, flocks of birds and regiments of men; but what shall we call the general use of flowers in compressed masses as they are commonly used with the idea that they are decorative? When the Japanese are able to see two flowers in one vase they have arrived at an extravagant use of these the most beautiful of nature's materials. Three are seen together very rarely.

How often one is appalled at the number of roses that it is possible to squeeze into one small jar. When it is not possible to get them all in, of course they can be thrown around upon the table. There also seems to be some lack of consideration as to where the crowded bowl shall finally find a resting-place. Flowers, for the sake of flowers in a room, are not decorative. They are decorative when they are of the kind in colour, textural feeling and arrangement to harmonize with the place in which they are put; otherwise they are an unrelated element in the room.

Vases, which are as attractive in themselves as flowers are by themselves, are bad decorative adjuncts. There is no better way to show flowers than to use them in glass vases, where their beautiful stems are as delightful as the flowers themselves. Use few in one place; carefully select them as to kind; put them together well in the vase, and carefully place them with reference to their surroundings. This will give flowers a place in the scheme of interior decoration befitting their beauty and also respecting their nature quality.

Somebody will ask: "What about china for a dining-room?" All the way along it has seemed easier to cite bad things in china than in any other medium. By this time it must be clear that even china must be subject to the same laws of selection as other articles of furnishing and fitting.

When plain white china is used there can be no great discord. Plain white, however, does not always seem to be strong enough structurally for the scale of the table and other dining-room accessories. The structural effect may be greatly strengthened and the decorative idea appear when a plain gilt band is used, or something so nearly approaching this that strengthening of structure is the fundamental impression one receives from it.

Let us remember that china is no place to show pictures and that if pictures on dishes become more important than the dishes themselves, the same conditions must obtain as those in which the picture frame is more important than the picture, or the carving on the chair more appealing than its proportion or the comfort derived from sitting in it. If flowers must be used in any other way than that described, their decorative material should be structurally applied, carefully censored as to amount, and the motifs so conventionalized that they are unquestionably "nature adapted to the material in which it is expressed."

These simple details are submitted in a practical way that it may be clear to him who reads that the smallest detail is not unimportant in the final criticism of any room. This criticism must leave the mind convinced that the room is a unit: a unit, first, in its function idea perfectly expressed, and second, a unit in beauty of expression, no element of which can be taken from it, and to which no element can be added without destroying the fundamental idea.

Every house ever built was really a period house. The modern American house, like any other period house, must, first of all, be considered with reference to the way in which it is to be used. Man now looks not to the past to find something to copy or to graft on to some irregular background as an adequate expression of modern life, neither is he satisfied with mere housing or sheltering qualities. The house appears to the educated thinking man as a necessity and as an environment for mental comfort and natural growth.

Decorators and owners alike are coming to see that life in this country is expressed in scientific terms; that with the present viewpoint, as a people we cannot develop a consciousness capable of feeling the art quality as did the Italians during the Renaissance period. Nor can we realize the imaginative possibilities in it as expressed in the Gothic period. They are seeing more surely the psychological relation between man and his works and the indisputable power of environment in determining one's future efficiency.

They are getting also nearer to the truth that principles are expressed in the language of colour and form as truly as they are in musical tones or through words or other symbols which express man's ideas. They are going to test the house, its furnishings, and its decorations, by the common-sense standard of functional modern fitness as well as from the intellectual and emotional standpoint of beauty, realizing the power of beauty in life development. This opens a new chapter in the field of interior decoration.

With these conditions in mind, every individual should approach his own problem. He will remember, then, that his house expresses himself, his intelligence, his ideas of art, his best conceptions of the aesthetic idea, and, so far as his means will allow, the qualities of materials which are best suited to fulfill this threefold ideal. This viewpoint dignifies the personal idea and places it foremost in the consideration of the decoration of a modern house. In the next place he will consider carefully the individual function of every room and how he can most consistently express this functional idea.

The geography of a house, and all it exacts, one's present incumbrances, their limitations and their possibilities, together with the knowledge of periods and all that they imply, these are also considerations of importance to him who would realize the perfect ideal of the house, and each room in the house, as a personal creation and a form of self-expression.

All this must be given in the language of colour, form, line and texture, governed by the principles which are the very structure of this language. Letting one's feelings and imagination be governed by his intelligence, the house will be sincere, consistent and suited to the person associated with it and living in it. It can be in this way no better, and should be no worse, than the individual whose personal creation it is.