But in falling the floor blocked the fireplace and the doorway. The consequences are—now we come to the present condition of affairs—that the old lady has had to do without a fire for certainly three winters, amongst others that bitter one of 1893-4, and her only means of egress and ingress is through the window. Of that not one half of the panes are whole; the gaps are stopped with rags.
MARIANNE'S COTTAGE
And now the floor is rotted through overhead by the mouldering thatch that covers it in part, and the rain drips through.[1]
Accordingly my lady has taken refuge in an old chest, and keeps the lid up with a brick.
"Tes terr'ble cosy," says she.
Last year, having a Scottish gentleman staying with me, I took him over to call on "Marianne." We had a long interview. As we left, he turned to me with a look of dismay and said, "Good heavens! in the wildest parts of the Highlands such a thing would be impossible—and in England!"—he did not finish the sentence.
I went back to Marianne and said, "Now, tell me why you will go on living in this ruin?"