Picturesque English Cottages and Their Doorway Gardens 
little parish of 
Barkham, one 
of which has 
been drained, 
and the old 
far m pulled 
down a year 
ago; while the 
other surrounds 
two cottages 
formerly a 
farmhouse. It 
encircles the 
dwelling on 
three sides, and 
is picturesque 
with its over¬ 
hanging trees 
and the reeds 
and rushes growing therein, in which moor¬ 
hens love to make their home. 
1 he destruction of an old house is a griev¬ 
ous loss. Sometimes strange things come to 
light when the wrecker’s hand is laid heavily 
on its walls and timbers. Hoards of old coins, 
dating back to the times of the Stuart mon- 
archs sometimes come to light, and occasion¬ 
ally we find curious relics of bygone super¬ 
stitions and primitive folklore. Beneath 
many a threshold of a Yorkshire farm, Canon 
Atkinson tells us, we should find a young 
calf buried there in order to ward off the evil 
of a cow “picking her cau’f,’’ a propitiatory 
offering to the 
earth-spirits: or 
you will dis¬ 
cover a bottle 
full of pins 
under the 
hearthstone 
in order to keep 
out witches. 
The proper 
ritual was to 
select nine new 
pins, nine new 
needles a n d 
nine new nails 
and put them 
into a clean 
bottle, which 
had to be se¬ 
curely corked, 
and then bur¬ 
ied with neck 
and cork down¬ 
wards, the fill¬ 
ing in of the 
hole being very 
carefully done. 
The effects of 
the spell soon 
began to work 
on the witch 
who tried in 
vain by all her 
arts to remove 
the cork, and 
suffered severe 
agony, which 
was only re¬ 
moved by the confession of her guilt, and 
the promise never to cast a spell upon the 
house again. If you would preserve your 
house from the effects of lightning, you 
should place the herb house-leek on the roof 
or chimney stack. It is a wonderful light¬ 
ning conductor. 
A relic of ancient customs may be seen in 
the flashings of mortar that connect the chim¬ 
ney with the roof. The bricklayers used 
to mark the flashing with a decoration made 
with the point of the trowel. I his pattern 
is a reminiscence of the old wicker house con¬ 
structed of twigs or pliant boughs woven 
between the 
posts. In the 
north of York¬ 
shire, Mr. Addy 
tells us, it is 
usual to wash 
bedroom walls 
with a drab 
color, and 
where they join 
the slanting 
roof to put 
waving lines of 
dark blue with 
spots of the 
same color in 
the folds. This 
is the same 
ornament used 
AT CASTLE COMBE 
A BERKSHIRE COTTAGE 
140 
