Page:Over fen and wold; (IA overfenwold00hissiala).pdf/252

 *sideration. It is the same familiar story of a harder struggle to earn a living, entailing besides a lessened leisure. Some one has to suffer for the benefit of cheap production, and the small man suffers most.

Bidding good-bye to our worthy miller, who, in spite of altered times, had a contented look that a millionaire well might envy, we remounted the dog-*cart and soon reached the sleepy, little, and erst market town of Falkingham—a town unknown to Bradshaw, because it has been left out in the cold by the railway, but none the less picturesque on that account! Here the road widened out into a large triangle, the base being at the end farthest away from us; this formed the old market-place, a pleasant open space surrounded by quaint and ancient houses and shops. One of these houses especially interested us, a substantial stone building with mullioned windows, set slightly back from the roadway and approached between two massive pillars surmounted by round stone balls. It was not perhaps actually picturesque, but it had such a charming air of quiet dignity, and looked so historical in a mild manner, as to make the modern villa seem a trumpery affair. It was a house that struck you as having been built originally for the owner to live in and to enjoy, in contradistinction to which the "desirable residence" of to-day always seems to me to be built to sell. The stones of this old house were delightfully toned into a series of delicate grays, enlivened here and there by splashes of gold and silver lichen. What a difference there is between the wealth of colourful hues of a time-tinted