Of the
mock villas that have been "put up" in this quarter, we must speak with
forbearance. Their little bits of Gothic plastered here and there; their
puny machicolations, square and pointed arches, and stained glass "cut out
into little stars"--are but sorry specimens of taste, and but poor
indications of comfort. They seem to totter like card-houses, and all their
spick-and-span finery vanishes beside a wing of the picturesque--a cottage
in true rustic taste, with rudely-arched virandahs, formed of limbs and
trunks of trees, intermixed with evergreens, and reminding us of the
"gnarled oaks and soft myrtles" of the poet's fancy; and with trimmed
arches of thatch over little casements, with flowers
"Blinding the lower panes."
Now is the little hatch-gate slammed with the wind, contrasting its rude
sound with the rusty creak of the "invisible" iron fence just set up, but
already
So loose that it but wants another push
To leap from off its hinges;
--the milk-white window-sill, or painted flower-pots ranged on bars of
cast-iron, like so many toys of Nature. Such was the contrast when we last
visited the "Grove;" the picturesque cottage was then as we have described
it, and its new-born neighbours were rising fast on every side, and we
would not insure its existence for a week longer; for the slicing, cutting,
and carving of this once beautiful spot, exceeds all credibility.
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