Page:An Encyclopædia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture and Furniture.djvu/655

 DWELLINGS FOR FARM SERVANTS. 031 nitiirc being a four-legged stool, some mefil-boxes, and the plouglimcn's boxes, which contain their linen and Sunday clothes, of which they are generally careful. Bothies now erecting have an upper story for beds, and a box for holding meal in the cooking- apartment. The utensils consist of one pan or boiler, and each man provides himself with a wooden plate and spoon." 1338. Remarks. Our readers cannot fail to observe the important service rendered by the box-beds, in the division of these cottages into two rooms : without them the apartment would be a miserable hovel ; for no description of open bed could ever either be so comfortable in itself, or admit of such an arrangement as would give any privacy to any part of the enclosure. At the same time, it must be acknowledged that the closeness and concealment produced by these beds, and the general crowding together of so much in so small a space, are any thing but favourable to cleanliness and even delicacy. The remark made by Mr. Gorrie, on the temptation afforded by having beds in the living room, " to lie down in them without much regard to cleanliness or comfort," is most important. The very circumstance of having to go up stairs to a bed-room is favourable to cleanliness, as well as to health ; because, in proportion to the completeness of the division of purposes or uses in a dwelling is the perfection to which each may be attained. The first step towards both cleanliness and comfort is order, or having a place for every thing ; and this can never be obtained, that is, no person can be orderly, where things used for totally different purposes are crowded together in a small space. Very little improvement, therefore, can be expected in the taste of the Scotch ploughman or his wife, till they have more room ; and till they have beds in rooms by themselves, which admit light on every side, and a free circulation of air, above, below, and around. The box-beds form an admirable partition ; and, indeed, taken altogether, are astonishing contrivances for surmounting difficulties ; for, when we consider that the Scotch plough- men are liable to change their masters, and, of course, their hovels, once a year, by what other means could they render such miserable abodes so habitable, without incurring the expense of fixed partitions, which, on removal, they could not carry with them ? When two separate bed-rooms are obtained, the bride's chest of drawers will be placed in the best of them, and this will pave the way for a bookcase, combined with a writing-desk, as an appropriate piece of parlour furnitiu-e. Supposing, then, that a ploughman's cottage consisted of two rooms below separated by fixed partitions, and two above, separated in the same manner, the box-beds being no longer necessary, the furniture of the four rooms would be as easily moved as that of the two now is. A great improvement in the condition of ploughmen, both with and without families, who live on farins, would result from their having one common kitchen, wash-house, boiler, oven, washing-machine, mangle, &c., as we have before indicated, § 1333 ; and when the ploughmen, and other labourers in agricultural districts, become as enlightened as the manufacturing classes, they will feel the necessity of having these things ; and, when they do, they will obtain them. We have said nothing of the want of those exterior appendages to cottages which are essential to decency as well as cleanliness, because the evils resulting from the want of them must be sufficiently obvious to every one who has perused the preceding pages of this work. Design II. — Two Country Labourers'' Cottages, built at Showerdown Braes, on the Beaufront Estate, in Northumberland. 1339. The Ploughman's Cottage, in Northumberland, is every whit as bad as that in the Carse of Gowrie. The plan, fig. 1204, it is to be observed, does not represent two cottages for common ploughmen, but for general day labourers ; the ex- terior appendages, indicated by — the dotted lines in the figure, never being added to those built on farmeries, as already observed, § 996. We have given the plan here to show the interior arrange- ment of these cottages, which we have been enabled to do through the assistance of Mr. John Ander- son, many years a respectable Northumbrian farmer. He in- forms us that box-beds are in general use in the ploughmen's cottages in Northumberland, for the same purposes as in the Scotch cottages ; but that, the hovel having only one window, the former can never be so usefully divided as the latter. In fig. 1204, the outer walls of each cottage enclose a space twenty-two feet by 1204 iijaiEH