MOVE TO WILTSHIRE 159 



from the little lake on the lawn since I had paid the place a 

 visit and agreed to become the tenant, and had abstracted from 

 every room in the house more or less furniture. Not having in 

 the first instance received an inventory, it was difficult for me 

 to name each article that he had taken, and yet I could take on 

 myself to swear to a considerable abstraction. My observation 

 having been backed by the report of my keeper, that he had 

 seen several articles of furniture removed, and that my landlord 

 had been busy about the lake, I charged him with the fact as 

 to the furniture, and insisted on the things he had taken away 

 being restored. The fish could not be replaced ; but a con- 

 siderable quantity of the furniture was put back again. TefFont 

 manor-house was the best " humbug " I ever saw : its appear- 

 ance outside, with its lawn and flower-garden and little lake, 

 overgrown as the house was, with ivy, roses, and jessamine, up 

 to the very chimney-tops, was veiy pretty ; but evei-ything had 

 been sacrificed to external appearance. There was only one 

 bed-room that was comfortable ; the dining-room opened into 

 the conservatory ; and the drawing-room was so situated that 

 you had to stand on a chair to look out of the window. The 

 dining-room ought to have been the drawing-room, but it could 

 not be made into one, on account of the situation of the kitchen. 

 It was a curious house : my study or morning-room was on the 

 lawn, the window opening to the ground; I had to ascend a 

 considerable staircase to the dining-room, though that also 

 opened on the lawn ; there was then a tower, up which you 

 went by a very steep ascent of stone steps, and when at the top 

 of the tower you stepped out upon the ground again. The fact 

 was, the house was let into the side of a hill, and you stepped 

 from the roof itself beneath the trees of a fir plantation. The 

 few trout left in the lake, from their scarcity, thrived in the 

 beautiful water rising but a mile away in the chalk of the downs, 

 till they were as red and good as little salmon ; and as they 

 sailed, in warm weather, beneath the shade of the trees, I could 

 always ensure a good fish for dinner baiting with a worm. The 

 water was so clear that while at Teffont I made myself master 



