154 



Cottage Husbandry and Architecture. 



either be arranged on one floor, as in fig. 30., or on two floors as in fig. 38. 

 The offices or outdoor appendages we propose, in either case, to be, a cow- 

 house, wood-house, tool-house, pigsty, dungpit, faggot-shed, and tanks for 

 liquid manure. The external form of the plan of the house we propose in 

 all cases to be the square, as containing the greatest accommodation with the 

 least quantity of walling, and as best calculated for accumulating and retain- 

 ing heat. We would place this square so as that a south and north line 

 would form its diagonal, or nearly so ; by which means the four sides of the 

 walls and roof would receive the sun's rays every day in the year. We 

 would always, if possible, place the out-offices on the north-west side of the 

 square, and the entrance on the south-east side ; but the entrance, by means 

 of a porch, and by placing the door of the porch on either of the sides or the 

 front, according to circumstances, may be made from any side, so as to accord 

 with the road or street, or other houses to which the cottage may be consi- 

 dered as belonging, and exactly the same internal accommodations retained ; 

 the out-offices also may be placed on any side at pleasure. The dairy should 

 always be placed on the north-west or north-east side. The materials of the 

 walls of this cottage we have shown in the plan as brick, and the walls them- 

 selves as built with a vacuity in the centre of each. This we propose to 

 be done in common brickwork, by keeping the width of the wall at 1 1 in., 

 working the outside fair (even) ; and, on the inside, keeping the headers or 

 cross bricks 2 in. within the line of the stretching or lengthway bricks, and 

 keeping these lengthway bricks 2 in. apart along the centre of the wall. 

 Walls built in this way are much handsomer on the fair side ; at least equally 

 strong with solid walls; always dry, and less easily penetrated by the cold in 

 winter or the heat in summer. The inner surface being uneven, is peculiarly 

 favourable for receiving and retaining the plaster. Hollow cottage walls may 

 also be built by placing the bricks, both headers and stretchers, on edge, as 

 practised by Mr. Silverlock of Chichester, and exemplified in several cottages 

 built by Mr. Donald at Woking. They may be also built with bricks halved 

 lengthways, by cutting with a wire before burning, as recommended by Mr. 

 Dearn. {Hints on an improved Method of Building, fyc. London, 8vo, 1821.) 

 The roof may be covered with tiles, slates, thatch, &c, at pleasure ; we 



should recommend a de- 

 scription of tile recently 

 manufactured at our re- 

 quest by Mr. Peake of the 

 Tunstall Potteries, New- 

 castle under Lyne. It 

 consists of a flat tile, with 

 the side edges turned up 

 (fig. 29. a), and a semi- 

 cylindrical tile for cover- 

 ing the edges (6). These 

 tiles are much in use in 

 Tuscany, and form a very 

 handsome roof, which may 

 be tolerably flat, and yet 

 perfectly water-tight, as 

 in the elevation of the 

 cottage fig. 40. 

 In countries where stone is cheaper than brick, that material may be used 

 for the walls, building them at least double the thickness, and adding that 

 thickness to the outside, as the dimensions of the apartments are already so 

 small as not to admit of any reduction. The walls may also be built of com- 

 pressed lumps of earth, or in the pise manner, or in the Cambridgeshire or 

 West of England method of building mud walls. The latter is shortly de- 

 scribed by Mr. Denson, in A Peasant's Voice, fyc. p. 28. 



