Page:An Encyclopædia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture and Furniture.djvu/657

 DWELLINGS FOll FARM SERVANTS. i)33 modern than the other. The windows have all stone frames and mullions, except that in the roof; the window v/ith the label over it is a very handsome one. The ground plan is just as it is here represented. The stairs in the larger cottage might be better placed ; and the smaller cottage should have a good window, instead of the small one near the fireplace ; but they are both comfortable dwellings in summer, though in winter the floors are damp. In the smaller cottage a spring rises close to the fireplace, althou<Th the floor is one foot and a half above the general surface. The village is situated in a deep valley, and the subsoil is chalk ; consequently there is scarcely a dry house in the parish. The water springs up from the saturated chalk in the cottages, and even in the roads, after much rain or snow ; so that on such occasions several of our cottages are not fit to live in. With us, the only remedy for a damp floor is, to dig out the chalk three feet deep, and fill up the vacancy with flints ; and even this is scarcely effectual, if there be a spring beneath, or any earth against the outer walls above the level of the floor. A raised platform would, therefore, be useless in such a situation. Indeed, I fancy it is impossible to have a dry house in low situations on chalk ; for even our few brick houses are damp ; and it is the same in all this district. I do not send this Design as a model for imitation, but merely to illustrate my opinion, that an old cottage, even of the simplest form (especially near freestone quarries), has generally a more pleasing effect, and con- tains more accommodation, than modern erections of this kind ; and tliis leads me to be an advocate for the old style of building. You will, perhaps, object to the bed-rooms being in the roof. They are not so in all cases ; but, v.-hen they ai-e, they have genefallv the advantage of being airy and spacious, though the shape of them is not handsome. They are generally ceiled high up in the roof, so that they are lofty in the centre, and, where the roof is of thatch, such rooms are cool in summer, and warm in winter ; and 1 observe that poor people, who care little for the shape of a room, generally pi-efer a good bed-room in the roof to one on the ground floor. When I add to the account I have already given of our dainp situation, that we are close to water meadows, which are con- stantly irrigated during six or eight months in the year, you will, perhaps, tliink this a most unhealthy village. The fact is quite the contrary. We have even very few persons afflicted with rheumatic complaints, and people live here to a great age. M'ith our small population we have few old people ; but, of these few, more than half are between eighty and ninety. We have no stagnant water even in the meadows, and the water here is aa clear as glass. Still, a damp residence is a nuisance to be remedied, if possible ; though this village affords an instance that it is not in all cases prejudicial to health." 1 344. Remarks. The interior of these cottages, it will be observed, is very different from that of either the Scotch or Northumbrian ones : irregularity and variety charac- terise the former, as much as plainness and simplicity do the latter. The one gives the idea of the cottage of a serf, and the other of that of a free man. We strongly suspect, however, that the occupants of the former cottages are the happier party ; for, from the manner in which they are paid their wages partly in kind, they have always abundance of plain food, and of heat. This may be said of all serfs, of the slaves of the West Indies, and of the feudal vassals of Russia and Hungary. The country labourer of England is in a transition state, between slavery and freedom ; in which he has lost the security of the one condition, without having obtained the independence of the other. For this end, lie requires a degree of knowledge which has not yet come in his way. 4 B