House and Garden 
CORNER HOUSE AT LAYCOCK 
slate or red brick. Honeysuckle, roses, 
clematis, ivy, japonica, beautify the cottage 
walls, in front of which are bright, well- 
kept flower gardens behind trim hedges. 
The old stocks still stand on the village 
green, as they stood when Lord Falkland rode 
from his home here to fight for King Charles 
and die at the Battle of Newbury. 
The little village of South Hinksey, near 
the wondrous City of Oxford, has some pretty 
cottages built of stone. Some of them are 
whitewashed. In some parts of Berkshire, 
near Ashdown Park and elsewhere, we thatch 
the mud orcement walls 
of our gardens, and so 
preserve them from 
the effects of weather. 
They look very quaint 
with their overhanging 
covering of thatch. 
England was once a 
land of monasteries, 
the beautiful ruins of 
which still remain and 
arouse the enthusiasm 
of all who visit these 
ancient shrines. They 
are sad relics of their 
former greatness. 
Many of them have 
been used as quarries 
for stone in time of 
careless regard for art 
and historical associations. 
Hence, in many cottages and 
farm-buildings we find carved 
stones and much plunder 
brought from old monastic 
piles. At Laycock, Wilts, on 
the banks of the Avon, there 
was a nunnery, the ruins of 
which doubtless provided ex¬ 
cellent building stone for the 
picturesque cottages which 
abound in the little town. We 
give a view of the farmhouse 
at St. Radegund’s Abbey, near 
Dover, which is in truth a mon¬ 
astic refectory of the twelfth 
century; and the farmer’s fam¬ 
ily work and sleep within the 
walls which once resounded 
with the tread of the monks and 
the voice of the Reader when they sat in 
silence at the long tables during their meals. 
The good local stone of Wiltshire has enabled 
the builders of that district to erect many 
beautiful cottages and farmsteads. The vil¬ 
lage of Purton has a grand series of houses 
representing in well-nigh unbroken succession 
the various stages of domestic architectural 
development in England from the time of 
Queen Elizabeth to the present day. Pot- 
terne also is full of quaint cottages inter¬ 
mixed with modern buildings. We should 
like to dwell upon the beauties of the early 
FARMHOUSE AT ST. RADEGUND’S ABBEY 
275 
