shoved back a little in order to provide a small porch,—we chose the latter. Every such house had a bay window in the projecting end, that being the front parlor, and all windows visible from the street must have yellow, varnished inside blinds.
One evening while the building was going on we went over as usual for our daily inspection and noted that the newly set studding marked the coming rooms. The connecting parlors seemed small to our eyes and tastes not yet trained to apartment and bungalow court proportions, so on the following morning father ordered out the wall between proposed front and back parlor, and our large sitting room,—living room it would be called today, was ordained. It, was unusual in Los Angeles where the prevailing mode demanded the two parlors. This room was large enough, 18’ x 33’, to stand the height of the ceiling, fourteen feet. Wide, high double-doors opened into the hall, opposite similar ones into the reception room, giving a feeling of spaciousness to the house.
The furnishing was of necessity more or less that which it is now customary to damn as mid-Victorian,—walnut furniture and a wealth of varying design in carpet, curtains, upholstery, wall-paper; but the whole in this case was kept in harmony by a key color, a medium olive, relieved by soft shades of rose and tan. Even the woodwork was painted to match the ground color of the walls, instead of glistening in the usual glory of varnished redwood or yellow pine. Everything was in good taste except a fearful and wonderful ceiling that was wished on us by the local wall-
