ner, and enter by any door that happens to be left ajar. In this way a fine black rat once got into my study and remained there for several days. I heard him distinctly behind certain heavy pieces of furniture, but could not get at him. He did a great deal of damage, though happily not to anything of much value, and he ended his career in a trap. Had I been away from home, the devastation caused by that one animal might have been serious. But his visit taught me a lesson, as he especially attacked portfolios, while the shallow tin boxes on shelves which I have adopted of late years entirely escaped his attentions. It is astonishing by what a narrow orifice a mouse will find her way into any place that she desires to visit. Drawers are sometimes so constructed that, although they fit well in front (for the sake of appearances), they are loose in the chest behind, and the consequence is that, if a mouse can get into the chest anywhere, she has all the drawers at her disposal. The first use she will make of any precious papers will probably be to tear them into little pieces and establish a comfortable nest in a corner.
In my article on "The Poor Collector" I touched briefly upon the question of frames. We have already noticed the curious fact that people who are strict about cleanliness in common household matters will tolerate dirty pictures. Very dirty frames are also tolerated in some public and private collections; in fact, I have seen collections where the notion that frames and pictures would be the better for being clean does not appear to have dawned upon the owner's mind. Surely, however, it is with these things as with all other things, cleanliness is pleasing in itself and an addition to the charm of beauty. One likes to see a pretty child with a clean face and an unspotted frock, though it might still be recognized as a pretty child if it lived in filth and squalor. In the case of pictures and their belongings, dirt is especially incongruous, because there can not be any poverty to excuse it. Pictures and their frames are superfluities in any case, and why tolerate a dirty superfluity?[1]
A word, in conclusion, may be said about the art of exhibiting things to advantage in private rooms. It is astonishing how few people understand the simple principle that some works of art may be injurious to others when shown by the side of them. For example, engravings are always killed by paintings, and the white margins of
- ↑ The one reason for dirty frames is the partial burnishing of the gilding. Oil-gilding can not be burnished; water-gilding, which takes burnish, can not be washed with water, and nothing but water will clean a fly-spotted, dirty frame effectually. Consequently a frame that has burnish upon it can only be dusted, and when it becomes really dirty it must be sent to the gilder; but, as regilding is expensive, it is postponed as long as possible—sometimes for a lifetime, and even for more than one generation. With oil-gilding only and one thin coat of varnish over the gilding (the varnish is nearly imperceptible if properly applied), a frame may be washed from time to time. This has been said already in the paper on "The Poor Collector," but is repeated here in a note for readers who have not that paper to refer to.
