Finally, a word must be said as to the renewal of mattresses and bedding. French and German housewives surpass us in this particular.

Abroad, a man comes to the house once a year, takes each bed into the garden - if there is one - or else removes it to his own abode. He unpicks it, removes all the wool and hair, which he picks to pieces - "teases," as it is called - with his own hands, replaces, sews up again, and then returns the bed, renewed and refreshed, the same evening. It is true that a good English wool and horsehair mattress keeps its shape much longer than the. more loosely made foreign ones, but all the same, the best of mattresses should be cleaned and renewed at least once in every two years.

Airing Beds

The half-hour's airing, too, which is usually given to a bed in the morning is not enough to keep it in a fresh and perfect condition. A sun and air bath should be given to beds - another good custom that we may adopt from our French and German neighbours. If a garden is available, a bed might be put out in it in the sunshine, but such a practice as this would shock the ideas of Mayfair and Belgravia. After all, there are things that they do better on the Continent.

Why some Open Grates are Wasteful - Points of an Economical Grate - Well Grates - Slow Com-bustion, Canopy,and Dog Grates - The Nautilus - Some Other Useful Patterns - The Mantelpiece

The wastefulness of the open grate has been alluded to already (page 3726, Vol. 6). Its more obvious faults are :

Badly designed setting, by which the grate is much too far back in the flue opening, causing loss of radiant heat by the screening effect of the sides.

Bad form of grate-back, causing the heated gases to escape in a backward and upward direction before parting with their heat.

Iron surfaces in contact with the flames, leading to loss of heat by radiation in the wrong direction.

Faulty design of bars, allowing the coal to fall through, and causing too rapid and therefore wasteful combustion.

These defects are common to most of the older types of grates, and to a certain proportion of modern ones.

The Efficient Grate

The points which should distinguish an efficient and economical open grate are :

It should project well into the room, so as to allow the heat to radiate over as wide an angle as possible.

The grate-back should be vertical or inclined forwards, and of sufficient area to become useful in abstracting heat from the gases which pass over it before they enter the flue. The heat thus abstracted will be radiated into the room instead of escaping up the chimney.

All surfaces in contact with the coals and heated gases (bars, of course, excepted) should be of fireclay, to prevent loss by radiation in a backward direction.

The bars should be set closely together.

Air should be excluded from beneath the fire, either by the use of a solid bottom, or by a closely fitting ashbox.

The fire should be as near the floor-level as practicable.

The diagrams illustrate both sets of points.

Improved Designs In Grates

So many improved designs of open grate have been introduced to notice in recent years that to enumerate them alone would occupy too much space. A careful review of their main features shows that they embody, in a more or less efficient form, the whole of the points just mentioned, though certain types have features peculiar to themselves.

A few examples will be considered.

Possibly one of the most economical of open grates, and one that has much to recommend it on the score of simplicity and

L good appearance, is that called the Teale grate. The principal feature of this grate is the absence of all superfluous ironwork. The back and sides of the fireplace are of firebrick. The firebrick back leans for -ward over the fire. The front bars, bottom grid, and ash-pan, or "economiser," alone are of iron, and the front bars are narrow, vertical, and closely spaced. The appearance and con- struction of this grate are shown clearly in the elevation and sectional diagram. The well grate. This is otherwise known as the " front hob fireplace " and the " fire on the hearth " grate.

Its main characteristic is the absence of bars, the fire being made on a removable iron grid, set slightly below the level of the raised hearth. The space below the grid communicates with an adjustable air opening in the side or front of the hearth, through which the fire draws the air it needs for combustion.

These grates are cheerful in appearance, and are perhaps the most economical and easily managed open fireplaces to be had.

An old and wasteful type of grate, showing how A modern and more economical form of grate. the heat escapes up the chimney, owing to the The heat is deflected into the room, the grate backward slope of the grate-back back being inclined forwards

The Teale grate, one of the most economical of open grates.

There is no superfluous ironwork, and the back and sides of the fireplace are of firebrick

With framing of glazed bricks or tiles, they are costly. But if built up of ordin-ary good brickwork, and with cast-iron framing , they cost no more than other and less efficient grates.

An adap-tation of the well grate prin-ciple, in which the raised hearth is dispensed with, the air regulation being effected by means of a perforated iron " eco-nomiser," is sold under the name of " The Bar-less "grate, and is said to be as economical in use as its prototype.