Oil the Coiistructiuii of Cottages. 
357 
The light required for the dwelling-room is furnished by a 
window 3 feet 6 inches by 3 feet, and should be placed near the 
fire-])lace, in order that the housewife may have the advantage of 
the declining light as long as possible, while seated at her needle. 
The bed-room and pantry windows may be 2 feet 6 inches by 2 
feet. The dwelling-room windows may be fixed ;* the others re- 
quire an open casement. Ventilation requires a height of 8 feet 
below stairs, and 6 feet 4 inches above: the height will be 15 
feet, including the floor. I do not like the low, thin-walled, 
slated cottages one sometimes meets with in gentlemen's grounds. 
A bed-room on the ground floor, especially on a clay soil, is not 
desirable. 
Warmth and dryness cannot be ensured unless the walls are 
14 inches thick; or 9 inches, and battened within ; or stud-work, 
and plastered on both sides. 
The aspect, if possible, should be a point or two to the west- 
ward of south. 
In large towns there is little choice of building materials : 
brick, and slate or tile, are necessarily used, and foreign timber ; 
and where houses stand thickly, durability and warmth may be 
consistent with 9-inch walls and slight carpenters' work ; but in 
the country it is not so : there we have a variety of materials, and 
to rural cottages I shall chiefly confine my attention. 
Moreover, a different kind of accommodation is required in 
town and country. In the former there is no occasion for ovens, 
or cellarage, or large pantry, and but little for coppers : the 
chimneys and fire-places, and the entire building, may conse- 
quently be on a reduced scale. 
The cost of cartage in the country is small, compared with what 
it is in towns : and here I would observe that all my estimates are 
exclusive of carting, and give the money price paid within six 
months. 
On the whole, I recommend a cheap material for walls, such 
as stone or clay, in preference to brick or stud work, as well on 
account of warmth as that the builder may not be tempted to 
stop short at .3 feet perpendicular height of wall on the chamber 
story, and gain the required height by means of a coved ceiling. 
I recommend also straw, or reed, or sedge, as a covering, both 
from the uniform temperature preserved by them and their rea- 
sonable cost. No one who has not experienced it can conceive 
the discomfort of a cottage covered with tile or slate. Ask the 
inhabitants, and they will tell you what they suffer from heat in 
* Every inhabited room should, I think, have a window to open, and a 
fireplace. An air drain round the building is, in damp situations, highly 
useful .— Braybrooke. 
