"Yes, they sometimes let their rooms—to families larger than ours—they supplied them with every thing—waited on them—did for them—and, as for the children, there wasn't such a place in the county for nice fields to play in."
We looked round the room—a good high ceiling, large window. "This is just the thing—and I am delighted we were told of your house."
"It would have been very delightful, but—but we are full already, and we expect some of our own family home."
And why didn't you tell us all this before?—we nearly said—and to this hour, we can't understand why there was such a profuse explanation of comforts—which we were never destined to partake of.
"But just across the road there is a very nice cottage, where you can get lodged—and we can supply you with milk, and any thing else you want."
Oho! there is some hope for us yet; and a few minutes saw us in colloquy with the old gentleman, the proprietor of the house. With the usual politeness of the Welsh, he dilated on the pleasure of having agreeable visitors; and, with the usual Welsh habit of forgetting that people don't generally travel with beds and blankets, carpets and chairs, and tables and crockery, on their shoulders, he seemed rather astonished when the fact of the rooms destined for us being unfurnished was a considerable drawback. So, in not quite such high spirits as we started, we returned to the Hay. After a little rest, we again sported our seven-league boots, and took a solitary ramble across the Wye. A beautiful rising ground lay in front; and as our main object was to get up as high as we could, we went on and on, enjoying the increasing loveliness of the view, and wondering if a country so very charming was really left entirely destitute of furnished houses, and only enjoyed by the selfish natives, who had no room for pilgrims from a distance. In a nest of trees, surrounded on all sides by trimly kept orchards, and clustering round a venerable church, we came, at a winding of the road, on one of the most enchanting villages we ever saw. Near the gate of a modest-looking mansion, we beheld a gentleman in earnest conversation with a beggar. The beggar was a man of rags and eloquence; the gentleman was evidently a political economist, and rejected the poor man's petition "upon principle." A lady, who was at the gentleman's side, looked at a poor little child the man carried in his arms. "Go to your own place," said the gentleman; "I never encourage vagrants." But it was too good-natured a voice to belong to a political economist.
I wish I were as sure of a house as that the poor fellow will get a shilling, in spite of the new poor-law and Lord Brougham.
The lady, after looking at the child, said something or other to her companion; and, as we turned away at the corner, we heard the discourager of vagrants apologizing to himself, and also reading a severe lecture on the impropriety of alms-giving. "Remember, I disapprove of it entirely. You are indebted for it to this lady, who interposed for you." So the poor man got his shilling after all; and we considered it a favourable omen of success in getting a house.
The next turn brought us to a dwelling which we think it a sort of sacrilege to call a public-house. The Baskerville Arms, in the village of Clyroe, is more fit for the home of a painter or a poet than for the retail of beer, "to be drunk on the premises." There was a row of three nice clean windows in the front; the house seemed to stand in the midst of an orchard of endless extent, though in reality it faced the road; and, with a clear recollection of the line,
"Oh, that for me some cot like this would smile,"