'FARM TO LET.' 97 



there was one large bow-window visible a long way 

 up the street and down the street and indeed up 

 and down another street too, (the only attempt at a 

 cross street there was,) for it was a corner window, 

 commanding therefore at a glance all the news of the 

 town. 



Ay ! and a deal more too ! Its wide look-out was, 

 like the little dogs just observed upon, emblematic as 

 well as actual. It was the News-room, Reading-room, 

 Petty - Sessions - room, Literary - and - Scientific - room, 

 Farmers'-Club-room, and a great many other rooms 

 besides, that there is not time to tell. Enough to say 

 that the smallest pin ever manufactured could hardly 

 have alighted point downwards on the floor of that 

 room metaphorically to speak but everybody heard 

 it ten miles round, and could tell you the shape size 

 colour and manufacturer's name within the twenty- 

 four-hours : and that was short time in those days. 



I shall not describe that room or its bow-window 

 any further. I conceive that the heaps of news-papers, 

 with the noses and spectacles poring over them, and 

 the polished mahogany tables, to sit and read them 

 at in the windows, so as to command the news inside 

 and outside, are sufficiently visible to all average 

 minds' -eyes without more specification. 



H 



