OLD ENGLISH INTERIOR. 123 



bugle-calls, as a body of horsemen are passing in compact 

 columns through the narrow street, from the castle, out by 

 the north gate, towards Roioton Moor. 



To be sure, it is a California and not a Cavalier sombrero 

 that shades my friend, and the men of war outside are but 

 mild militiamen, carrying percussion-lock carbines indeed, 

 but who have fought for nothing so valiantly as for the corn 

 laws. But when shall I again get as near as this to Prince 

 Charlie and the Ironsides 1 and shall I not make the most of 

 it ] At least, there is no prompter s bell, no carpenters in 

 their shirt-sleeves rushing in and sliding off the scenery. That 

 1539 over the way is TRUE ; I can see the sun shine into the 

 figures. Away, then, with your 1850 ! I will drink only old 

 wine or better What ho ! a cup of sack ! Shall I not take 

 it easy in mine inn ? 



The house is full of most unexplainable passages and un 

 accountable recesses, of great low rooms and little high 

 rooms, with ceilings in various angles to the walls, and the 

 floor of every one at a different elevation from every other, 

 so that from the same landing you step up into one and down 

 into another, and so on. Back of a little kitchen and big 

 pantry, down stairs, we have another parlour. In it is a grand 

 old chimney, and opposite the fireplace a window, the only 

 one in the room. It is but three feet high, but, except the 

 room occupied by a glass buffet in one corner and a turned-up 

 round-table in the other, reaches from wall to wall. To look 

 out of it, you step on to a raised platform, about three feet 

 broad, in front of it, and on this is an old, long, high-backed 

 settee. I must confess that it is not the less pleasant in the 

 evening for an unantique gas-light. 



As I lay in bed last night, I counted against the moon 

 seventy-five panes of glass in the single window of our sleep 

 ing apartment. The largest of them was four by three, and 



