Fifty years later, Guicciardini, after praising the general state of the civilization and courtesy of the people, and remarking on the beauty of the public and private buildings, says: "But after all this if one enters their homes and notices the abundance of all kinds of furniture, and the order and neatness of everything, it gives one great pleasure, and one looks upon it as a wonder. And indeed it is, for there is nothing like it anywhere else in the world."

The inventories of the day give evidence of a great variety and number of cleaning utensils. Brooms and brushes of all kinds, tubs, pails, buckets, scrubbers tied with red leather, dust brushes called hogs, floor brushes, hearth hair brushes with brass and wooden handles occur in every house. One inventory of 1685 shows how well supplied a rich home was with articles for cleaning and scrubbing. These are as follows: five whiting brushes, one brush to clean the floors, five rubbers, three small painting brushes, four dust brushes, two floor brushes, two hair brushes, two hearth brooms, one chamber broom, one rake brush, one brush, one hay broom without a stick, and two Bermudian brooms with sticks. Cooking and cleaning implements and utensils were kept in the kitchen and in the cellar underneath. Pictures by Dutch masters show that in clement weather a good deal of housework was done in the tiled court or yard adjoining the kitchen.

As an example of the ordinary burgher's home, let us take the house on one of the corners of the Mat Wharf on the Voorstraat in Dordrecht, dating from the beginning of the seventeenth century, and dwelt in by Andreas Hulstman Janz, merchant" in wood, his wife Elizabeth Balen Matthews, and his children Jan, Christine and Alette.

The house has a sharp pointed gable and is three storeys high. The windows are provided with balconies, and a larger verandah runs along above the blue stone stoop. On each side of the rounded door embellished with iron-work are small windows supplied with trellises, as are likewise the four windows above the verandah that light the little office or "comptoir." As we tap the iron knocker, a man or maid servant opens the door, and we notice that the little windows dimly divined through the creeper-shaded trellis are set in lead and supply but little light. The front hall runs on the left-hand side directly through the house, opening into a little yard that communicates with some smaller apartments and the kitchen.

On the right hand side is a small apartment, called the "little comptoir," the favourite room of the mother and her daughters when the housework is done, for they can see through the trellis and "watch the street."

In the hallway, a narrow staircase leads to the second floor, "the best part," where the "show" and "guestrooms" are situated, while on the third floor are the bedrooms, and in the garret, the drying-room, mangle-room, brass and tin rooms. Here also the peat and firewood are kept. Passing up the stairway, we enter the living-room, which looks upon the front hall, and from which, when the door is open, a view of the street is obtained. This arrangement is familiar in many Dutch pictures, notably in that of The Sick Lady (Plate XXXVII).

The living-room is rather sombre. The white walls are partly covered with pictures, and the floor is strewn with fine sand in a pattern resembling a carpet. Three large pieces of furniture are conspicuous, two oak cupboards standing on heavy ball feet, their broad flat tops ornamented with handsome beakers and vases of porcelain; the third piece is a large sacredaan kas hung with green curtains. In this the library is contained, consisting of a few books of travel, atlases, poetry by Cats, Vondel, Godewijck, Antonides, a number of religious works, commentaries on the catechism, hymn-books, the medical works of Battus and Beverwijck, and a few translated novels (for in this day there was but little Dutch fiction). In the centre of the room there stands a large and heavy oak table, with low chairs of the same, and covered with leather seats arranged symmetrically around it. In one corner of the room we note a reading-desk on which rests an enormous Bible bound in leather, with great brass mounts. The chimney-piece is enormous; if it is winter, a tremendous peat and wood fire is perpetually burning; if summer, the fireplace is ornamented with large, handsome faience, or porcelain vases.

This is the room in which the family gathers for breakfast, dinner and supper, and passes the winter evenings pleasantly enough.

From this room we enter the kitchen. We hardly know what to notice first - the marble tiles shining like glass, the brass and pewter gleaming like gold and silver from the racks and dressers, the well-filled china closet, the rose-red painted table, with the yellow painted rush-bottomed chairs, or the general effect of charm, cheerfulness, colour and neatness. We are told that the lady of the house calls this her "holy" (as she calls the showroom the "tabernacle"), and allows no cooking to be done here. There is a small back kitchen built for this purpose called "snuiver" (cooking shed), where all the food is prepared.

Before leaving this room we must describe the dresser, in which all the articles for breakfast service are kept and, in poor houses, left-over food. The used napkins are folded and placed here, and there are drawers for table linen and other small utensils. It contains a candle-drawer, and upon one of its shelves stands the heavy brass candlestick. The peculiar extinguisher is called familiarly "the cat's head," on account of its resemblance to the head of a cat. This is narrower at the bottom than the top, and has a handle on each side. This stands next to the peat-box, often the lower part of a pot cupboard opened and shut with a slide Underneath the chimney is placed the fire-pot, for stoves are not known. These innovations, imported from Germany, were heartily despised and called contemptuously "stink-pots" and "muff-boxes."