Monogram and Inscription in the Mermaid Inn, Rye
The chief charm of Rye is to walk along the narrow streets and lanes, and see the picturesque rows and groups of old fifteenth-and sixteenth-century houses with their tiled roofs and gables, weather-boarded or tile-hung after the manner of Sussex cottages, graceful bay-windows—altogether pleasing. Wherever one wanders one meets with these charming dwellings, especially in West Street and Pump Street; the oldest house in Rye being at the corner of the churchyard. The Mermaid Inn is delightful both outside and inside, with its low panelled rooms, immense fire-places and dog-grates. We see the monogram and names and dates carved on the stone fire-places, 1643, 1646, the name Loffelholtz seeming to indicate some foreign refugee or settler. It is pleasant to find at least in one town in England so much that has been left unaltered and so little spoilt.
Inscription in the Mermaid Inn, Rye
CHAPTER IV
IN STREETS AND LANES
I have said in another place that no country in the world can boast of possessing rural homes and villages which have half the charm and picturesqueness of our English cottages and hamlets.[10] They have to be known in order that they may be loved. The hasty visitor may pass them by and miss half their attractiveness. They have to be wooed in varying moods in order that they may display their charms—when the blossoms are bright in the village orchards, when the sun shines on the streams and pools and gleams on the glories of old thatch, when autumn has tinged the trees with golden tints, or when the hoar frost makes their bare branches beautiful again with new and glistening foliage. Not even in their summer garb do they look more beautiful. There is a sense of stability and a wondrous variety caused by the different nature of the materials used, the peculiar stone indigenous in various districts and the individuality stamped upon them by traditional modes of building.
We have still a large number of examples of the humbler kind of ancient domestic architecture, but every year sees the destruction of several of these old buildings, which a little care and judicious restoration might have saved. Ruskin's words should be writ in bold, big letters at the head of the by-laws of every district council.