The best method of artificially lighting a dining-room is hard to decide. Nothing is prettier or pleasanter than candle-light, and it is preferable to gas or lamps in that it does not heat a room perceptibly. But candles are expensive, if enough are used to produce a respectable illumination, and nothing is more dismal than eating by a dim light. Good candles are costly, and cheap ones not only give a poor light, but drip and smoke and smell, and are otherwise intolerable. A new style of candle has recently been introduced which is pierced through its length with three holes. These tiny pipes are supposed to carry off the melted wax, and their advocates claim that these candles will not drip on the outside.
Except on state occasions, candles are barred out for people of moderate means, and they must have recourse to lamps or gas. The light should always be suspended above the table, except, of course, where candles and candelabra or a tall-stemmed lamp are used. A side-light does not serve the purpose of a central one, for some one must always sit with his back towards it, and his plate is thus in a perpetual eclipse. Pretty hanging lamps come at all prices, but it never pays to get a cheap one. It may do very well for a time, but before long the burner will be out of order; the machinery by which the wick is turned up or down will prove refractory, and repairs will do little good. The only efficient way of mending a poor lamp is by buying a new one.
Among the best-known makes of lamps there is one with a powerful burner which gives a clear, steady flame, equal to two or three ordinary gas-jets. The only draw-back connected with it is the intense heat it radiates, which makes it objectionable in summer. Such a lamp costs about seven dollars, is furnished with a large ground-glass shade, and supplied with fixtures and a chain, by means of which it may be raised and lowered at pleasure.
Whichever is used, gas or kerosene, the glare should always be softened by a shade of some kind. Globes of ground or colored glass may be used on gas-burners, or, if they are of clear glass, the light may be subdued by the Japanese half-shades, which can be slipped over the lower half of the globe. A pretty fashion is that of fastening a Japanese umbrella, stick upwards, under the chandelier, although this darkens the table too much, unless there is a strong light above it. If any member of the family suffers from weak eyes, and is distressed by the light that is none too brilliant for the others, quaint paper-screen shades, also of Japanese make, may be hung on the side of the globe towards the sufferer. The long pliable wires attached to these shades permit them to be twisted at almost any angle. Or the fancy paper screens which imitate roses, pond-lilies, sunflowers, and the like may be hung on the globes.