In the construction of farm-houses and cottages there have been, probably, fewer changes than in large mansions. Cottages in England seem to have generally consisted of a single room, without division of stories. The Spaniards who came to England in Queen Mary's time, wondered when they saw the large diet used by the inmates of the most homely-looking cottages. "The English, they said, make their houses of sticks and dirt, but they fare as well as the king; whereby it appeareth (says Harrison), that they like better of our goode fare in such coarse cabins, than of their own thin diet in their princelike habitations and palaces."
In various counties we can scarcely fail to be struck with the difference in the forms of the cottages, as in the height of the building, the pitch of the roof, as well as the materials. Only let the traveller on the Brighton railway look out after he has passed Redhill, and he may see evidence of the truth of the above remark. Cobbett has left us this charming picture of the Sussex cottages in one of his Rural Rides:—
"I never had," he writes, "that I recollect, a more pleasant journey, or ride, than this into Sussex. The weather was pleasant, the elder-trees in full bloom, and they make a fine show; the woods just in their greatest beauty; the grass-fields generally uncut; and the little gardens of the labourers full of flowers; the roses and honeysuckles perfuming the air at every cottage door. Throughout all England, these cottages and gardens are the most interesting objects that the country presents, and they are particularly so in Kent and Sussex. This part of these counties has the great blessing of numerous woods; these furnish fuel, nice, sweet fuel, for the heating of ovens and all other purposes: they afford materials for the making of pretty pigsties, hurdles, and dead fences, of various sorts; they afford materials for making little cow-sheds; for the sticking of peas and beans in the gardens; and for giving to everything a neat and substantial appearance. These gardens, and the look of the cottages, the little flower-gardens, which you everywhere see, and the beautiful hedges of thorn and of privet,—these are the objects to delight the eyes, to gladden the heart, and to fill it with gratitude to God, and love for the people; and as far as my observation has gone, they are objects to be seen in no other country in the world. Those who see nothing but the nasty, slovenly places in which labourers live round London, know nothing of England. The fruit-trees are all kept in the nicest order; every bit of paling or wall is made use of, for the training of some sort or other. At Lamberhurst, which is one of the most beautiful villages that ever man set his eyes on, I saw what I never saw before, namely, a gooseberry-tree trained against a house. The house was one of those ancient buildings, consisting of a frame of oak-wood, the interval filled up with brick, plastered over. The tree had been planted at the foot of one of the perpendicular pieces of wood; from the stem which mounted up this piece of wood were taken side limbs, to run along the horizontal pieces. There were two windows, round the frame of each of which the limbs had been trained. The height of the highest shoot was about ten feet from the ground, and the horizontal shoots from each side were from eight to ten feet in length. The tree had been judiciously pruned, and all the limbs were full of very large gooseberries, considering the age of the fruit. This is only one instance out of thousands that I saw of extraordinary pains taken with the gardens."
Those who love the picturesque will excuse our halting to sketch an episode from the history of the royal forest of Ashdown, in Sussex, once possessed by John of Gaunt, and hence called "Lancaster great Park." Upon the borders of the forest lies the manor of Brambertie of Domesday, and Brambletye of Horace Smith; the home of the Comptons, and in the tale of fiction, as in fact, dismantled by Parliament troopers, and within two centuries a ruin. Richard Lewknor is the first person described as of Brambletye. He most probably built in one of the forest glens the moated mansion known as "Old Brambletye House," which, with its gables and clustered chimneys, and its moat and drawbridge, long remained an interesting specimen of the fortified manor-house of the reign of Henry VII. We remember the old place, some sixty years since, but it has long been taken down. Towards the middle of the seventeenth century, Brambletye came into the possession of the Comptons, an ancient Roman Catholic family; and here Sir Henry Compton built himself, from an Italian design, another Brambletye House, of the white stone of the country. Over the principal entrance to the mansion were sculptured the coat-armour of Compton, with the arms of Spencer, in a shield, on the dexter side: and on the upper story was cut in stone, C. H. M. 1631. This fixes the period when the house was built; and when Sir Henry Compton, who had before inhabited the old moated house in the neighbourhood, abandoned it to take up his residence in this once elegant and substantial baronial mansion.
From the court-rolls of the manor, it does not appear who succeeded the Comptons in the property; but Sir James Rickards, in his patent of baronetcy, 1683-4, is described as of Brambletye House. The story goes, that "a proprietor of the mansion being suspected of treasonable purposes, officers of justice were dispatched to search the premises, when a considerable quantity of arms and military stores was discovered and removed; he was out hunting at the time, but receiving intimation of the circumstance, deemed it most prudent to abscond." The historical version is, that in the Civil War, Sir John Compton, a true Royalist, took an active part against the Parliament armies: although never capable of any regular defence, yet Brambletye, being partially fortified, refused the summons of the Parliamentary Colonel Okey, by whom it was invested and speedily taken. The mansion was subsequently deserted. From a sketch taken in 1780, the principal front was nearly entire: it consisted of three square towers, the entrance doorway being in the central tower; the two wings had handsome bay-windows; the three towers were surmounted with cupolas and weather-vanes; but one had half its cupola shattered away, and was internally blackened, as if with gunpowder. In front of the house were an inclosed courtyard and two entrance-gates, one flanked by two massive, square towers, with cupolas. Horace Smith having named his romance Brambletye House, the opening scenes being laid there, has sent hundreds of tourists to pic-nic among the ruins; but the spoilers were constantly at work. Some fifteen years ago, "all that remained of Brambletye House was one of the towers clothed with stately ivy, and little more than one story of each of the other towers; the intervening portions, with their bay-windows, had disappeared. Nature had, however, lent a helping hand: by the shrubby trees and the ivy, the ruins had gained that picturesqueness which so often lends a graceful charm to scenes of decaying art."[40]
[THE ENGLISHMAN'S FIRESIDE.]
ealthful Warmth and Ventilation are to this day problems to be worked out; and few practical subjects have so extensively enlisted ingenious minds in their service. Yet, much remains to be done.