THE THATCHED ROOF 187 



other : the front with old oak balusters, with broad 

 and easy steps and landings bidding you " rest and 

 be thankful " upon each, and with room for three or 

 four people to go up abreast ; the back stairs 

 narrow and almost pitch-dark, winding round and 

 round from kitchen to attics like those of an ill- 

 lighted church tower, each step different from its 

 neighbour in depth and height, and each, therefore, 

 a pitfall to those who were not to the manner born. 

 But that which, apart from its personal associa- 

 tions, gave its chief charm to the house as a whole, 

 and that without which I should not be writing of 

 it here and now, was its high-pitched thatched 

 roof. It was this which, with its broad over- 

 hanging eaves, with its ridges and its furrows, 

 its snug corners and its sunny basking-places, its 

 grey chimneys and its moss-grown coping-stones, 

 gave abundant shelter to all the birds which most 

 attach themselves to man. " Ubi aves, ibi angeli" 

 was a favourite dogma of no less an authority than 

 St Thomas Aquinas ; and if he was right, then the 

 Rectory must indeed have been angel-haunted. It 

 was, of course, the home throughout the year of 

 many, too many perhaps, pert and chirping and 

 irrepressible house-sparrows. The starlings, most 

 sprightly and energetic among birds, used, early in 



