I had also learned to prepare myself for the trials of this house-hunting. In my side pocket were two flasks, one containing water, the other brandy. I had often grown faint during our wanderings, and a sup of brandy now and then had kept up my strength. I saw that my wife was lower spirited than usual, and I mixed some spirits and water in the tin cup attached to one of the flasks. She accepted the refreshment eagerly, and I took a larger draught myself, and was much cheered by it.
"It always," said my wife, in a brighter tone, "makes one feel rather faint to look over a house which has been empty a long time, especially a house which is so far away from--from any others."
"It is almost as if we were in a grave," I observed.
"How can you say such dreadful things!" she retorted. "If I were a man I should have more courage."
There were three rooms on the ground floor, each of considerable dimensions, and all in shocking dilapidation. The paper had peeled off the walls, and was hanging in tattered strips to the ground; quantities of plaster had dropped from the ceilings, and here and there the bare rafters were exposed; there were holes in the flooring; the grates were cracked, the hearths broken up.
"A hundred pounds," I observed, "would not go far toward making this house habitable."
"It wouldn't be half enough," said my wife.
Upon quitting the dining room I inquired whether she wished to go any further.
"I am going," she said stoutly, "all over the house."
Upstairs we went to the first floor, where we found the rooms in a similar condition to those below.