Having witnessed the morning process called "tidying the room," for many
years, and with ever-increasing astonishment, I can describe what it is.
From the chairs, tables, or sofa, upon which the "things" have lain
during the night, and which are therefore comparatively clean from dust
or blacks, the poor "_things_" having "caught" it, they are removed to
other chairs, tables, sofas, upon which you could write your name with
your finger in the dust or blacks. The _other_ side of the "things" is
therefore now evenly dirtied or dusted. The housemaid then flaps every
thing, or some things, not out of her reach, with a thing called a
duster--the dust flies up, then re-settles more equally than it lay
before the operation. The room has now been "put to rights."
[29]
[Sidenote: Atmosphere in painted and papered rooms quite
distinguishable.]
I am sure that a person who has accustomed her senses to compare
atmospheres proper and improper, for the sick and for children, could
tell, blindfold, the difference of the air in old painted and in old
papered rooms, _coeteris paribus_.
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