Page:An Encyclopædia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture and Furniture.djvu/251

 COTTAGE DWELLINGS IN VARIOUS STYLES. QO'J genera], however, thatched roofs should either project so far as to protect the wall and windows, and also a space of two feet broad, to ser-c as a passage, and thus render a gutter unnecessary ; or, they should have two or three feet at the eaves tiled or slated, in which latter case a much cheaper and neater form of guttering may be adopted ; say as in fig. 389- One reason why guttering is objectionable to all thatched roofs is, that, by tlie continual decay of the thatch, they are very apt to become choked up. A large clumsy gutter, like that shown in fig. 388, is, no doubt, less liable to this than a smaUer gutter, such as is suitable for a thatched roof with slated eaves, like that in fig. 389 ; but both will be found to require continual attention, and, after every violent shower, to be apt to choke up the descending pipe. There is a porch of treUiswork to this Design, which is so far good, as any description of porch is better than none ; but there are two trunks of trees, in the manner of columns, without plinths below, and with- out any thing in the way of an entablature above, which, we must say, we think in superlatively bad taste. What can be worse than a column supporting nothing but thatch ? There is a false window to the parlour, on one side of the porch, which we disapprove of; because there must be something deficient in the invention of the Architect, when such windows are found requisite in buDdings of this description. A window in a thatched roof is always bad ; because the number of angles which it presents to the wind and the weather,, makes the thatch which covers them go rapidly into decay, and soon admit the rain. If such windows are ever admitted, they should be in the style of that shown in Design XX., or in fig. 157. We never can bring ourselves to consider thatch as a proper covering for a building of two stories ; we would limit it to low buildings, with mud or rubble- stone walls, and where no guttering was required : but let taste be free. The compact- ness of the plan, however, is commendable ; and this is, perhaps, all that we can say in its favour. The cubic contents of this Design are 19,632 feet, from which our readers may easUy form a General Estimate. Design LXXIV. — Design for a Cottage Dwelling, in tJtt Old English Style, and of a Construction suitable for having Part of the Walls covered with Weather- Tiling. 458. Accommodation. The ground plan, fig. 390, contains an entrance-lobby, a ; haU and staircase, b ; parlour, c ; kitchen, d ; wash-house, with oven-boiler and sink, e ; pantry,/; dairj-, ^ ; beer cellar, A ; and coal cellar, i. The chamber floor, fig. 391, contains three good bed-rooms, k, I, and m ; and a light bed-closet over the lobby, n. N 390 391 459. Construction. The foundations and walls of the ground-floor story should be of brick, or of rough stone with brick dressings (bricks at aU the angles, whether of doors, windows, or corners^ and with brick arches to the windows. These walls, of whatever material constructed, should have what is called a Welsh cornice (two or three over sailing (protruding> courses of brickwork, one of which has dentils, formed by the ends