OUT-OF-TOWN PLACES 



low walls, it need not cheat us wholly of our 

 chambers. A French roof, with great perpen- 

 dicularity to its first pitch, will give airy 

 height for upper rooms and ample ventilating 

 space above; and such a roof, slated in dia- 

 mond pattern, will contrast admirably with 

 the natural surfaces of the boulders below, 

 and the irregular lines of mortar. 



Again, I do not know anything in the laws 

 of taste, apart from conventionalisms, to which 

 we all yield so implicitly, which would forbid 

 the placing of an upper story of wooden con- 

 struction upon a ground-story of stone. The 

 idea may be shocking at first, but I ask the 

 reader to fancy for a moment an irregular 

 mass of honest stone building of the height 

 and simplicity I have suggested, pierced with 

 windows of irregular proportions (just where 

 needed for the best light). Next imagine a 

 wooden structure of a story in height, with 

 simple sharp pent roof, relieved by a gable 

 half down its length, placed upon the stone — 

 overhanging it if you please by a foot in width 

 and length, with its floor timbers rounded into 

 the shape of supporting corbels ; then imagine 

 here and there a half-dozen of these floor- 

 beams projecting four feet or more, so as to 

 form a dainty balcony at some upper window, 



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