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Read Ebook: Happy-Thought Hall by Burnand F C Francis Cowley
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Ebook has 778 lines and 33531 words, and 16 pages
I pass over his opinion and continue.
I repeat "For argument's sake." Formula admitted.
Well then, I suppose it to cost four thousand, I can only spend two thousand. Very good, I'll only have, as it were, two thousand pounds' worth of house.
"Half a house, in fact," says Milburd.
This is not the way to put it, but I am, I feel, right, somehow.
I appeal to my friend Jenkyns Soames, who is writing a book on Scientific Economy.
He replies that mine is correct, in theory, if taken from a certain point of view. We admit that this is a sensible way of putting it. And are, generally, satisfied.
"How about your staircases," says Boodels, "and your kitchen, eh?"
I observe that this is only a commencement. That my object is to remember everything gradually, and so omit nothing.
Here I find the library has been forgotten.
Add on the library in dots; like a railway map.
"How do you get there from the study?" asks Milburd.
"Why, by doors, through the dining-room."
"Awkward," suggests Boodels.
"No; I don't think so."
"How do you light your study?" asks Cazell.
"Eh?..... Ah!..."
"Then," says Milburd, as if there was an end of the whole thing, "you lose a bed-room by that, and another over the billiard-room."
True.
Milburd says: "Throw out a bay."
This is his invariable resource.
I throw out a bay-window and then we survey it carefully.
"Well ... Yes."
"Then the front door will be ...?"
I indicate in dots the front door, and the drive.
"Precisely," says Boodels, "and just as you're in the middle of a game of something, up comes a party to call; you can't say you're not at home, and the servants can't open the door while the ball, or whatever it is, is flying about."
True ... Then ... bring it more forward. Or make a new plan.
"Then the bath-room's forgotten," says Milburd. Add it in dots to tennis court.
Then over every room there'll be a bed-room and dressing-room. So that'll be a good house.
"What style?" asks Cazell.
"Elizabethan, decidedly," I reply. They think not.
"Gothic's useful," says Boodels.
"Italian's better," observes Milburd.
"Something between the two," suggests Cazell.
Twelve rooms below, twelve above. Stables outside, added subsequently.
I say, Estimate it roughly.
He does it, after a day or so.
I ask how long the building would take? Chilvern is of opinion that it would be six months at the least.
Then I say I'll give it up. I wanted it for Christmas.
Then the notion of the party must be abandoned.
Boodels says he's sorry for that, as he can't go into his own house just now, it being under repair.
Cazell suddenly exclaims, "I tell you what we ought to do!" We listen. He goes on. "We ought to take a house for the Winter Season, the lot of us together, and then ask our own friends."
Carried nem. con.
NOTIONS--GUIDE WANTED--BLACKMEER--CHILVERN--HIS ELEMENT--VIEWS-- OBSERVATIONS--DISCUSSIONS--FISHING--TROUT--SHROPSHIRE--THE LAKE-- THE SOLITARY CASTLE--HERMITS--GAMES--DIFFERENCES--AT THE HOUSE.
We go down. Hertfordshire. I find on inquiry that there is no Guide to this county. Black ignores it, Murray knows nothing about it, and Bradshaw is silent on the subject.
Arrived at the station we inquire for Blackmeer Hall. Six or seven miles to drive. I ask if this distance isn't against it? I am met by the unanimous answer, "Not at all."
Chilvern points out the beauties of the road as we go along. We become silent, not liking to have things perpetually pushed under our notice, as if we couldn't see them for ourselves.
He pooh-poohs the notion of Derbyshire. Then he continues giving us bits of useful information, like a disjointed lecture.
Cazell begins to resent it, so does Boodels.
Chilvern says, pointing left and right, "Ah, these fields are the place for mushrooms."
Boodels says that his own fields in Essex are better.
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