It is not always easy to drop at a moment's notice on a furnished residence in a retired locality; but fortune presently introduced our adventurers to a deaf carpenter, a man rich in cottages of the required description, and unaffectedly eager to supply their wants.

The second place they visited, standing, as it did, about a mile and a half from any neighbours, caused them to exchange a glance of hope.

On a nearer view, the place was not without depressing features.

It stood in a marshy-looking hollow of a heath; tall trees obscured its windows; the thatch visibly rotted on the rafters; and the walls were stained with splashes of unwholesome green.

The rooms were small, the ceilings low, the furniture merely nominal; a strange chill and a haunting smell of damp pervaded the kitchen; and the bedroom boasted only of one bed.
Morris, with a view to cheapening the place, remarked on this defect.
'Well,' returned the man; 'if you can't sleep two abed, you'd better take a villa residence.' 'And then,' pursued Morris, 'there's no water.