312 FIELD AND FERN. 



and does not afford vermin the faintest hope of 

 gaining a settlement. The principal entrance is at 

 the north-east corner, near the granary. Beneath 

 it, on the east range, are the cart-shed fitted with 

 grease-pot niches, the barn, the straw-house ; and be- 

 hind them the sawpit, the smithy, and the engine- 

 house, where a gigantic fly wheel works an eight-horse 

 power engine. At the corner of the south range is 

 a twelve-stall stable, eleven feet high, and divided 

 by a harness-room. Future Robin Buruses could 

 have no more comfortable ingle to ruminate by, 

 as the fire flashes cheerfully on the polished pine 

 wainscoting ; and the bump of order among the six 

 must be feebly developed indeed, if with so many 

 aids to neatness on the walls, they cannot keep their 

 harness bright, and in its own domain. 



Each of them has a separate bin, holding 

 the exact weekly allowance of oats and beans. 

 The stalls are nine feet by six, and iron-bound ; 

 the water (which is drawn from cocks in the 

 stable), hay, and oats are all kept strictly to 

 their three compartments in the manger, where 

 the rope of the halter acts in a long square tube, 

 and is untied from below. The overseer's house 

 forms the centre of this east range, and is con- 

 nected with the dairy, in which the delf dishes 

 rest on large Arbroath flags, and the Guernsey milk 

 is placed in tin bowls as being an essential cream- 

 raiser. Polished tiles from the Hague, which repre- 

 sent a girl milking, a cock and hen, the Ranz des 



