As many strips as may be required having been laid one on top of another on the board, the first strip may be pasted, but a little judgment must be used as to the time that may be allowed to elapse before the paper is attached to the wall. If the paper be cheap, and therefore thin and unsubstantial, it must be hung up as quickly as possible after the paste is put on; but if it be a stout, good paper, some two or three minutes may elapse between pasting and hanging; and a thick paper may be left even twice as long, to allow the damp to penetrate the paper and render it more easy of manipulation and less liable to be crushed or broken. For easier manipulation it is better to loop up the lower end of the paper, the paste causing the paper to adhere slightly where one part comes in contact with another. Then fold back the top, and putting the hands, which should be perfectly clean and free from paste, under this fold, attach the paper to the wall, bringing the top upwards with the hands to meet the cornice. Care should be taken beforehand to make a guide line on the wall, or to see that the woodwork round the window is perfectly upright, and this will assist the amateur in fixing the first strip truly perpendicular. After attaching it lightly to the wall, the plumb-line may be applied to see that all is true and vertical, and if all is right release the fold, and, after letting the paper hang straight down, lift it away from the wall, except for about six or eight inches below the cornice, and then let the strip fall, when it will gently float down into its place.

The next step is to press the paper against the surface of the wall in every part, and for this purpose the amateur must be provided with some clean soft cloths. First of all, the paper must be pressed down the middle from top to bottom with firm but gentle pressure, avoiding all rubbing, which may have the effect of starting the color and smearing and spoiling the paper. Then press from the centre outwards on both sides in a downward direction. The paper in some cases will lay smooth and flat against the wall, but if the paper be cheap and thin there will in all probability be many wrinkles all over the surface. Do not attempt to press these flat. The paper has stretched under the influence of the moisture of the paste, and as it dries it will contract again and lay as flat as possible all over the wall to which it is attached. Lastly, draw the scissors over the paper just below the cornice and just above the skirting-board, making a crease. Then pull the paper gently from the wall as far as may be necessary, cutting off the edges along the mark or crease made by the scissors, and restore the ends to their places, dabbing them lightly as before with the cloth, which should be so doubled up as to form a large, loose pad.

The second strip may now be put up in the same way. Here, however, the chief anxiety will be to match the pattern neatly, for if the first strip be put up perpendicularly the other strips will be perpendicular as a matter of course. Nevertheless it will be as well for the amateur to test his work occasionally by the plumb-line, to make sure that it is not getting out of the perpendicular.

It may be that the amateur will not be successful in his first effort, and then all that can be done is to sacrifice the strip of paper, pull it down, and try again. As in everything else, practice is necessary to enable a man to do this work well and quickly.

It will be advisable, then, for any beginner to try his 'prentice hand in an attic or some small room of no great consequence, in order to give him some idea of the way in which paper must be handled and attached to the wall. He will soon gain confidence in himself, and find no great difficulty in capering other rooms where it will be absoutely necessary that the work be neatly and accurately done.

Borders should be neat in design, and match the paper in this respect and in color, or if the colors do not harmonize they should be in agreeable contrast. A cable pattern

generally looks well, or the Grecian rectangular pattern, known as the Greek key pattern. The representation of a simple molding is often very effective, and when the paper is plain in character and geometrical in pattern a floral border is admissible. It must be remembered, however, that a border, however good it may be, tends to detract from the apparent height of the room, and therefore is not so well calculated for a low room as for a high room, to which the horizontal lines of the border impart an appearance of breadth and space.