[§ I.] General
If ever the counties of England recover their bygone loyalty to their own materials and their old traditions, then cob-building will return to Devon and the West. Cheap bricks, cheap transport, and the ignoble rage for fashions from the town went far to oust provincial cob from the affections of those whom, with their forbears, it had housed so well for several centuries.
Whether the new loyalty be from within, or be imposed from without by force of circumstances, matters little. What does matter is the fact of its revival.
For with it will come again the building of cottages that are knit intimately to their sites and surroundings as of old, cottages consanguineous with the ground they stand on, be it brick-earth, rock, or common soil.
The soil of Devonshire and of many parts of Wessex and of Wales serves excellently well for building in cob or “clom.”[3]
The soil itself suggested the construction, and the men of Wessex were quick to take the hint and to act on it.
The yeomen and small-holders of earlier days were commonly builders too, and often built their own homes in their own way, yet by the guiding light of local tradition.
Thus the old Devonian countryman in need of a house would set to and build it himself—of stone if that were handy and easily worked, of cob if it were not.
No doubt the doors and windows would be made and fitted by the village wheelwright; but the cottager himself would thatch or slate the roof as naturally and successfully as he built.
The skill and care with which these versatile amateurs built their houses was not always of the highest, and careless construction, like other sins, is visited on the children—the worse the sooner.