t)8 THE EQUIPMENT OF THE FARM. 



however, best attained when cottages are built not more 

 than two together. Speculative builders, who erect 

 nearly all the houses occupied in villages by the work- 

 ing classes, can often satisfy the requirements of the 

 Building Act, and pass the sanitary inspector, at a total 

 cost of 130 per house, including the fee simple of the 

 land. We have never succeeded in building a pair of full- 

 sized labourers' cottages, with three bedrooms each, with 

 coal-house and privy, for less than 240, not including 

 the land, and charging labour and materials at prime 

 >cost. The price now allowed by the Land Commissioners 

 to be charged on an estate for cottages, is 400 per pair ; 

 *and it is seldom that the price under their specifications can 

 be brought much lower. On large farms, where a number 

 of cottages are necessary, it is well to have a few 

 with two bedrooms only; these are suitable for newly- 

 married couples, or for those whose families have gone out 

 into the world. 



Those who read Mr. Strickland's valuable report upon th^ 

 cottage competition at Leeds on the occasion of the Royal 

 Agricultural Society's meeting there in 1861, will find that 

 the best arrangement involves in every case a living-room, 

 scullery, and pantry, on the ground-floor, and three bed- 

 rooms above. In the Kirtlington cottages one of the 

 bedrooms is on the ground-floor, and there are only two on 

 the upper floor. The scullery is in a lean-to at the back of 

 the house. This cottage, so far as the double- storied part 

 of the house is concerned, thus includes two rooms below 

 .and two above. The upper bedrooms ventilate into a 

 staircase passage, which is between them and is open to 

 the roof. It must be admitted that there is an advantage 

 in having one bedroom on the ground-floor enabling a 



