(1848)
A very old house stood once in a street with several that were quite new
and clean. The date of its erection had been carved on one of the beams, and
surrounded by scrolls formed of tulips and hop-tendrils; by this date it could
be seen that the old house was nearly three hundred years old. Verses too
were written over the windows in old-fashioned letters, and grotesque faces,
curiously carved, grinned at you from under the cornices. One story
projected a long way over the other, and under the roof ran a leaden gutter,
with a dragon’s head at the end. The rain was intended to pour out at the
dragon’s mouth, but it ran out of his body instead, for there was a hole in
the gutter. The other houses in the street were new and well built, with large
window panes and smooth walls. Any one could see they had nothing to do
with the old house. Perhaps they thought, “How long will that heap of
rubbish remain here to be a disgrace to the whole street. The parapet
projects so far forward that no one can see out of our windows what is
going on in that direction. The stairs are as broad as the staircase of a castle,
and as steep as if they led to a church-tower. The iron railing looks like the
gate of a cemetery, and there are brass knobs upon it. It is really too
ridiculous.”
Opposite to the old house were more nice new houses, which had just the
same opinion as their neighbors.
At the window of one of them sat a little boy with fresh rosy cheeks, and
clear sparkling eyes, who was very fond of the old house, in sunshine or in
moonlight. He would sit and look at the wall from which the plaster had in
some places fallen off, and fancy all sorts of scenes which had been in
former times. How the street must have looked when the houses had all
gable roofs, open staircases, and gutters with dragons at the spout. He could
