Mexican homes as a rule are closed off to the world by high blank walls of yellowish masonry, topped with broken glass to discourage escaladores, or climbing burglars. The gardens and fountains and other delights are hidden, as in an Arab city.

A man builds a fine house; and now he has a master, and a task for life; he is to furnish, watch, show it, and keep it in repair the rest of his days.

Small rooms or dwellings discipline the mind, large ones weaken it.

The surroundings householders crave are glorified autobiographies ghost-written by willing architects and interior designers who, like their clients, want to show off.

A man's house is his stage. Others walk on to play their bit parts. Now and again a soliloquy, a birth, an adultery.

At a certain season of our life we are accustomed to consider every spot as the possible site of a house.

Our houses are such unwieldy property that we are often imprisoned rather than housed in them.

Though the house was not large it had, like all houses in Floral Heights, an altogether royal bathroom of porcelain and glazed tile and metal sleek as silver.

The worst of a modern stylish mansion is, that it has no place for ghosts.