An English Cottage and an Irish Cabin. 657 



face of the water. Towards Midsummer the branches were 

 taken up, when the bark loosened perfectly from the alburnum, 

 and was immediately pulled off and washed in clean water, to 

 make the glutinous matter separate from the bass. After- 

 wards it was hung up and dried. 



To gardeners resident in the country where the lime tree 

 abounds, and at a great distance from large towns, this method 

 of making bass will be found of great importance. 



Branches of even an inch in diameter are useful for this 

 purpose, but, of course, large branches and stems afford more 

 layers of bass. 



Art. V. Description of a Cottage in England, and a Mud Cabin 

 in Ireland. By Mr. John Howden, heretofore Agronome. 



Sir, 



Your very tempting offer of an Encyclopaedia for an essay 

 on the cottage system, induces me to attempt an article on 

 that subject; and, though I have a most excellent library, 

 worth some scores of pounds, I prize no volumes so much as 

 yours : yet I greatly fear that I can write very little worthy 

 of a stereotype edition on any subject. Providence seems to 

 have designed that I should never be an author : you have 

 seen some of my attempts ; but none are fit to be read twice 

 over, much less to be translated into different languages, and 

 every good work ought to bear that test. 



I do not pretend to agree with you on every subject, yet I 

 never read the productions of an author or editor with whom 

 I coincided in so many things. I do not agree with you in 

 the cottage system to its full extent. I am a cottager myself, 

 at least I live in a cottage or lodge, and such a cottage as 

 seldom falls to the lot of a poor man : it is not, as Oliver 

 Goldsmith describes, 



" A chair-lumber'd closet just twelve feet by nine;" 



but thirty feet by twenty-one, exclusive of kitchen and wash- 

 house, fifteen feet by fifteen feet. My house and parlour are 

 entered by two distinct doors from a porch in front, and each 

 has a distinct backdoor ; so that, if bumbailiffs or other intru- 

 sive visitors should come upon me, I have always a backdoor to 

 creep out at. I have a small cellar under each staircase : the 

 one under the parlour is calculated to hold two hogsheads of 

 ale and two barrels of beer, .with shelves and recesses for a 

 few bottles of cowslip, currant, and other wines, for a friend 

 or so ; that under the house is chiefly used as a pantry, and 

 Vol. VI. — No. 29. u u 



