her face and person, and the detail is charming. I doubted that every post-office clerk in the three A warm complexion, tending to brown, fine eyes, kingdoms knew where Deddington was, just as well brown hair, fine teeth, and infinite wit and vi- as he knew where Shiretown was,- or, for that vacity.”

matter, where Northshire itself was. I could admit Writing to George Montague, Esq., June 23, that, for correspondents writing from America, or 1759, Walpole has a small paragraph which is very the Continent, or anywhere beyond seas, it was exsuggestive : “My Lady Coventry and my niece cusable to add “Northshire," or "England”; but Waldegrave have been mobbed in the Park. I am for correspondents dating from England, Ireland, sorry the people of England take all their liberty Scotland, or Berwick-upon-Tweed, I saw no excuse out in insulting pretty women."

whatever for any addition at all. We are at this moment the champions of Lady Sinee then, however, I have lived in many places Waldegrave, but we owe no duty to Lady Coventry; considerably larger even than Shiretown; and it and seeing that the former has nothing to do with has happened so often within the last twenty years the stupendous exhibition detailed in the following that I have met with respectable people, who could extract from a letter of the Honorable J. West, to have no possible inducement to insult me, and who Lord Nuneham, June 26, 1759, we may, without yet professed themselves entirely ignorant of the exany betrayal of trust, transcribe a few words which istence of Deddington, that, as I said at first, I have will show the racy sequel of the admiring mobbing now been brought to confess my native place to be alluded to by Horace Walpole. “Will it be any a place of no importance whatever. news," asks Mr. West, “ to inform you that last! Per contra, I remember a time when I thought Sunday se'nnight your friend Lady Coventry was no other place could be of importance compared mobbed in the Park? and that, to prevent it, last with it. Sunday twelve sergeants of the guards were ordered! Let me try to describe it as it appeared to me to disperse themselves about in case of a riot, and a then. sergeant and twelve men were ready, in case of It was a place of incredible cleanliness, liveliness, wanting assistance. This her ladyship knew, went and architectural wealth. to the Park, and pretended to be frightened direct- Its cleanliness was patent to every one ; for were ly; desired the assistance of the officer on guard, there not two old men whose whole and sole duty who ordered the twelve sergeants to march abreast it was to scrape the mud to the sides of the streets before her, and the sergeant and twelve men be- after every day of bad weather ? hind her; and in this pomp did the idiot walk all Its liveliness would have been sufficiently guarthe evening, with more mob about her than ever, anteed by the simple fact of its having a market as you may imagine, her sensible husband support- once a week, when the carriers' carts came in from ing her on one side, and Lord Pembroke on the all the neighboring villages. But beyond this, the other. This is at present the talk of the whole omnibus went to Shiretown no less than three days town."

a week, returning always the same night. While, The admirable devotion of a wife during both ber to crown all, there were no less than four fairs in marriages, and the amiable graciousness of her dis the year, one of which lasted two days. position during the exalted position which signalized Its public buildings were the pride of all intellithe second alliance of Maria Walpole, might be as gent people. The church had the loftiest tower, easily substantiated as her beauty. But to do this and the biggest windows, and the ugliest faces on is besiile our purpose. It is enough to say of her its corbels, and was the oldest, probably, of any that she was a flower which, long after the colors church in England. There could hardly be a doubt of youth had faded, long after the hues of life itself that at some time (about the introduction of Chrishad assumed the graceless complexion of the dust, tianity into this Island) it had been a minster. The diffused a wide, and left behind a sweetly-lingering monument in the chancel was probably that of one odor of tender, and gentle, and benevolent actions. of the early bishops, — as would have been easily

Her death occurred August 23, 1807, at her proved if its head had not been knocked off and house at Brompton, when she was in her seventy-| lost. second year, and had survived her husband almost The Odd Fellows' Hall was a very large and two years. Her funeral cortege, setting out from well-proportioned building, which would hold at the Brompton at six o'clock in the morning of August | least a hundred thousand people, — or perhaps with 31, arrived at Windsor at half past eight in the a little squeezing, a million. It was in this magnifievening; and she was buried by torchlight in St. cent hall that we used to have our lectures, for it George's Chapel.

was the hall of the Mechanics’ Institute as well as the Odd Fellows. Owing to its vast size, there was

always found some difficulty in lighting it, as well as WITHOUT RESERVE.*

in filling it. The audience used to gather close to I. — DEDDINGTON REVISITED.

the lecturer and his candles, and leave a great dark THERE is nothing like going away from a place

void behind. And I used to think that if ever I - quite out of sight - for getting the true view of:

of should achieve greatness like that of the lecturer,

and stand on a little platform behind a little table, Now that I have lived away from Deddington a

and have two candles and a glass of water to myfew years, and twenty years are but a few to look self, and a long stick to point out the figures on the back upon. - I must confess I see it to be a place of diagrams, and a vast assemblage of people (like no importance whatever, commercially, archæologi- |

ci) that I used to see) to listen to me for as long as cally, historically, or in any other way.

ever I liked to talk, - then indeed I should not I used to feel somewhat aggrieved when my let

have lived in vain, and could die happy. ters came addressed to " Deddington, near Shire

But the noble dimensions of the Odd Fellows' town,” or “ Deddington, Northshire"; for I never

Hall were, perhaps, never so apparent as on magic

lantern nights. * Froin the advance sheets of London Society for November, 1867.! The philosophic entertainment of the magic lan

NE

Nov

tern was one of which we were very fond at Dedding- of them have since turned out men of very moderton. I have not, of late years, seen any instrument of ate performance. that kind nearly equal to the one we used to have, John Barleycorn was tried for divers high crimes nor any figures nearly so curious and interesting and misdemeanors, and, I having been called to the The figure of the man's head, with a nose that kept Bar a few days previously, and promoted with unon growing as long as the curtain would allow, and exampled rapidity to the honorable office of her then was continued on the nearest wall, was always Majesty's Attorney-General, it was to me that the a great favorite; and so was the ogre's head with duty of prosecution fell. the rolling eyes, when the eyes happened to arrive I was fortunate enough to secure a conviction. about the same time as the head. The nodding Indeed, John Barleycorn was put down to be found mandarin was hardly liked so well, perhaps owing guilty in the little books from which we all learnt to some defect in the machinery, which always pre- our parts. vented his head from getting within two or three The speeches which I delivered on the part of feet of his body, and thus produced a somewhat un- the Crown gained me so much applause, both on real effect. But the dissolving views were always the occasion of the public trial and at various suba great success; and that in which one of the pyra- sequent times, when I repeated them at my father's mids of Egypt was distinctly seen lingering on the instance from a table in our parlor; and the whole terrace of Windsor Castle, while her Majesty and business, in short, was so pleasant to me, that I had all the royal family glimmered through it, was justly for some years afterwards a design of applying in regarded as a triumph of optical art. As for the earnest for the post of Attorney-General. The duchromatropes, they never failed to throw us into ties of that office I had already proved to be quite raptures, and I hardly remember a more painful light, and I understood it to be a position of conand distressing accident than that of the breaking siderable emolument. Omitting, however, to go in of the tape which held up the sheet on which our for the appointment at once, and to take the tide of chromatrope was then projected. It was not merely my fortune at the flood, our committee (on whose that the chromatrope itself was thus lost (for we testimonials I had chiefly relied) was broken up, could not admit it to be at all the real thing as pro- and I have never since seen my way to apply for jected on the end of the hall behind us), but the the next vacancy with any chance of success. schoolmaster and his assistants being thus suddenly! This, however, is a digression, for which I beg revealed behind the curtain, were so flurried and pardon. It was of Deddington I wished to speak. put out that they went away without the vote of Of the Church, the Odd Fellows' Hall, the Temthanks to which they were so richly entitled. perance Hall, I have already spoken. What more

It was only once a year, when the Odd Fellows could any one wish? Well, besides these, there walked in procession with a band of music, and were the chapels, – Ebenezer, Methodist, and banners, and gay rosettes and sashes, that you Ranters, for we were great chapel people at Dedwould have known them for what they were. At dington. other times they counted merely as publicans, And as if these were not enough, you had only to butchers, tailors, joiners, shoemakers and what not. walk two miles out of Deddington before you came They appeared, however, to be not merely odd, but to the Captain's mansion, which was generally adgood-natured fellows too, and lent their noble hallmitted to be the finest structure anywhere outside for all sorts of purposes.

the Arabian Nights; as indeed the Captain himself Not only were the Mechanics' Institute tenants was the finest and the most imperious gentleman. in permanence, so many nights a week; not only ! Such was Deddington as it appeared to me when did the magic-lantern people, the mesmerists, the I lived there twenty years ago; and its people were ventriloquists, have each their turn in it; it was a high, superior race, suited to their place of abode. also the place for speeches at election time in the I was told by Ted Tyler that the Captain once Tory interest (Deddington being a polling-place for got a boy seven years' transportation for not taking the Riding), while the Rads, as they were called his hat off quick enough when he met him, or for there, held out at the Temperance Hall.

| putting it on again before the Captain was out of Then, too, the missionaries used to come and sight, I forget which. And though no one else was have their turn sometimes in the Odd Fellows' quite so high as the Captain, I remember one or two Hall. But the only occasions on which it was ever retired drapers and grocers, who lived outside the nearly full were those of the grand tea-parties, for town, to whom I looked up with an awe which no which at that time the Deddingtonians were famous. one else, however exalted, has ever since succeeded To these the thirsty villagers from round about in inspiring within me. flocked numberless, and thus, swelling the popula- Two houses in the town were conspieuous above tion of Deddington itself, even that monster hall the rest. One of them was called “ Myrtle House” was now and then filled to overflowing.

(not that there were any myrtles near it, which, The Temperance Hall, our other chief assembly indeed, were as rare as turtles in that part of the room, was smaller, but still a room of great magni-country), and was the residence of Miss Bellamy, a tude. Speaking approximately, I should say the maiden lady then about fifty. Agricultural Hall at Islington appears to me now Myrtle House was the largest house in the town, about as large as the Temperance Hall appeared to - a massive square stone building, with a front me then. I don't know any building which ap- nearly all windows, and a porch with pillars of fine pears to me quite so large as the Odd Fellows' Hall | polished marble.

Miss Bellamy was known to be a lady of great It was in the Temperance Hall that I made my wealth. Her father had been, many years prefirst appearance as a public character in "The Trial viously, a successful barrister, and she, his only of John Barleycorn," a very exciting drama, which child, had succeeded to her fortune while yet was enacted by sundry youths of tender years and young. An early disappointment, some said, -ingreat promise, - youths of great promise being ability in the male sex in general to find courage to plentiful at that time in Deddington, though most propose to so rich a lady, others said, - had kept

used to appear.

her single, and single there was every prospect of at me as if they, too, had some suspicion of old acher remaining.

quaintance. For, indeed, when she walked out on fine days. The church, though still a good one, did not look with her footman behind her, and her lapdog beside so palpably a cathedral as I used to think ; nor inher, or when, on wet days, she brought out her big deed, I was ashamed to admit, was its architecture carriage (for she kept a carriage, and even visited without suspicion of later centuries than I would fain at the Captain's at long intervals), he would have have believed. been a bold man who, seeing her, could have con- The Temperance Hall was, though I could hardly ceived the notion of making an offer of marriage to believe it, converted into an iron-founder's castingMiss Bellamy.

shed. The other house of the two was the house of my The Odd Fellows' Hall - whether the adjacent uncle. It was not nearly so grand as Myrtle House, bouses bad been raised or it had been lowered and and it had no special name of its own, being merely shortened — looked externally only like one of a known as “Lawyer Enoch's, in Broad Street”; row of houses of very moderate pretensions. but it was a good, substantial house, much bigger Broad Street belied its name, and looked, in fact, than most of the other houses in the town.

quite narrow. Externally the most remarkable thing about it! I met the Admiral's carriage (he was promoted was that the front door was approached by a series from Captain long time ago). I kept on my hat, of steps, - quite a long flight it seemed to me, and though three months have elapsed no proceedwith a hand-rail beside them for safety. And as ings have yet been taken against me. my uncle himself happened to be — or seemed to Passing Myrtle House, I happened to strike my be, which was the same thing — the tallest man stick against one of the fine polished marble pillars. whom I had ever, up to that time, seen going The ring was unmistakably wooden, — and indeed about loose, I imagined the steps had been put there the paint sadly wanted renewing. to assist the advantages which nature had given When I reached my uncle's house it was no longhim in getting a good view of the surrounding coun-er a surprise to me to find only four steps at the try. He was my father's younger brother, — Chris-door instead of the old flight of forty or fifty, and to tian name Thomas, - my father's being William. find in him, instead of the very tallest man, a man And while I am naming names I might as well, on who had never been very much above the average the chance of the reader's caring to hear it, name height, and who now, at seventy-two, stooped a little my own. It also is, as my father's was, William with years, and more with the weight of troubles Enoch. At that time I added “Jun.” to it; but that had been laid upon him. that, alas ! is no longer necessary, my dear old senior having been gone these many years to the dear wife who had gone before him, and whom I hardly

11. — TO BE SOLD BY AUCTION. ever knew, and to the dear lads and girls (all gone I SAID the occasion of this visit of mine to Dedtoo, except me) who were, I hope, better children dington, though not a funeral, was a sad one. You to him than ever I have been

shall judge. Thomas Enoch, my uncle, or, as he was more My uncle, in the long practice of his profession, commonly called, “ Lawyer Enoch," was a prosper- made a good deal of money; and in the early part ous man; and if honesty and goodness of heart, and of his career, when he had a family about him, he strict integrity deserved prosperity, he had only his was very careful to increase his savings. Of later just wages. His practice had been a large and a years, when successive bereavements had left him lucrative one (chiefly conveyancing) for many only one daughter, Ada, to care for, he thought less years, and about the time I left Deddington he had and less of money. He gave very generously to the admitted my cousin Tom, his son, to a share of the poor, not only through public institutions, but by business, which he hoped soon to hand over to him many a secret charity, where his right hand knew entirely.

not of his left hand's bounty. Many a Christmas But what is our life? Is it not even a vapor ? | board smoked appetizingly, which, but for his open Young Tom (so healthy and strong he always hand, would have been bare. Many a grate, in looked) died years ago. Cousin Jem died within a many a cottage, on many a winter's night burnt with year of him, and Charlie with almost as short an a ruddy glare, which, but for him, would have been interval.

black and cold. And, beyond this, he spent liberIt has happened that almost every visit I have ally upon his house and daughter. His house was paid to my native town since I first left it has been noted far away for the perfect taste and elegance of on an errand of death. Mound after mound in the its equipments. From attic to cellar it was his pride little churchyard, and a long row of tombstones, to have everything as complete and as good as first of our own branch of the family, then of my money could make it. uncle's, give the dates of my journeyings.

"You will have quite enough, my girl, when I When I went three months ago, though I went have spent all I can in this way,” he would say, "to on a very painful errand, it was a positive relief to make the men run after you." me to think I was not going to a funeral.

As for Ada herself, his trouble was that money It was midday when I arrived, and market-day. was not able to buy anything quite good enough for The town looked strangely deserted as compared her. Her little phaeton and her pair of grays was with the old boyish days. There were the old car- the prettiest turn-out in that Riding; but it was not riers' carts; there were stalls (butchers' stalls and nearly good enough. So of her jewelry, her dressthe like) scattered here and there in the street, at es, her piano, her barp, her love-birds in their gilded which their owners waited patiently for the custom-cage, her wonderful Pomeranian, “ Nelly” (which ers who stayed away as patiently. I thought I took the first prize at the dog show year by year, as noticed here and there in a stranger's face some a matter of course); all these were good, were, intraces of an old schoolfellow's features ; and now deed, of the very best, but were not good enough, and then, but not so often, the strangers looked hard he said, — not half good enough.

For Ada was the light of his life, in whom and for Well, it happened just at that time that a favorwhom alone he any longer cared to live.

| able chance presented itself for me to enter into She hersell declared she had given up all hope of partnership with my present partners, so I sold out the men over running after her, and alrealy regard- my shares in the bank and found employment for od bermilf' as the legitimate successor of Miss Bel- my money in business; doing so, I confess, not lamy in the honors of old maidenhood at Dedding-without many regrets at withdrawing from so flourton. “ Five-and-twenty alreadly, papa, and not yet ishing a concern, and many misgivings as to engagod," she used to say ; " I'm afraid I'm a bad whether I should ever again have from my savings lot. I shall go and ask Mise Bellamy what is the so comfortable an addition to my small income as I best thing for rheumatism at my time of life, and see had had till then. if she can exchange my Nelly for a respectable, well- These regrets ceased, and were exchanged for a conducted cat." Or if Miss Bellamy happened to profound thankfulness, when, a year ago, the new drive past at such a time, she would make a great manager absconded, and it was found that he had pretence of beckoning to her from the windows, with committed the bank to liabilities which rendered it i view to stopping her and asking these questions, perfectly insolvent, and involved the ruin of nearly but always took good care not to let that lady see every shareholder in it. her motions.

But my delight at my own escape was sadly temIn these demonstrations against Miss Bellamy her pered by regret that my good old uncle was fatally papa, she noticed, never joined, but, indeed, always involved in the great catastrophe. deprecated thein, and seemed to have a singular! The bank being on the principle of unlimited respect and deference for that lady, which was un liability, of course those shareholders who had monaccountable, seeing that they never, under any cir ey had to make good the deficiencies of the poorer cumstances, visited each other, and, to Ada's proprietors, and Thomas Enoch's wealth was but as knowledge, had not even spoken to each other for a drop in the bucket of the overwhelming commitmany years.

ments of the bank. "Old maid, indeed," he would answer her, “I For a while it was hoped - as it always is hoped never feel sure, until you come in to breakfast, that on such occasions — that the concern would be you have not eloped in the night."

wound up without calling on the shareholders to And of course Ada, though not engaged, had not contribute more than the capital they had already reached five-and-twenty without having the chance paid up. to be so. The simple fact was, that she would not But a few months proved the groundlessness of leave her father, and was cold to all advances, and such a hope, and such of the shareholders as were that, as he seemed to find all his happiness in her, more abundantly endowed with prudence than she was content to devote herself' wholly to him. honesty, anticipated the calls of the official liqui

It must be now about five years since my uncle dators by levanting, and leaving those to bear the finally gave up to his two chief clerks the business burden of debt whose sense of honor refused to alwhich, if I had had the good luck to be a lawyer low them to follow such examples. instead of a civil engineer, he would have given up My uncle stood it out to the last, surrendered to mo. And from that time he and Ada became everything he possessed to the creditors, and saw more and more to each other. He took to travel himself utterly bankrupt in all but his integrity. ling with her a great deal from place to place. He This visit of mine to Deddington, in fact, was to turned all his investments into the simplest chan- enable me to be present at the sale of all his housenel, so that his incomo might come to liin, whether hold effects, and to buy in again at the auction, for his fivm ronto, or stocks or mortgages with as little use and Ada's, such things as I could not see taken trouble or anxiety to lumself as passible. In fact he from them so long as it was in my poor power to met his houm in exter, that he might wait in peace prevent it. But, unhappily, it was but little that I for the day of his sleparture

could do, my means being much more limited than The end pioption that he made in his determiny good-will. matron for the end of businpes was that for two vears or I li was Ada who opened the door for me. She wwmis ho violento licitations and continue to was cheerful, and resigned to her alterai lot, thinkImi pop the count Rank. It is now about ing indeed only of her father, as he seemed to think *** **** and a half hoe he marriei aut, however, on d er hinum non intention, and your hais att Sve had plans of her on, chie: of which was that the *** At the same po horrores the plan of all willeniucated, neeir laces to take Anth to the in his slot should 8,459 4 cops the #1 con porerne As lur ber Uber, she the ****, in what he will help

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other's arms. And she pillowed his head upon her | pocket. He took it as a high personal compliment breast, as he had so often pillowed hers.

that the two London brokers should have come She took me through the rooms, and a very down to Deddington. " There is not another house dreary round it was. The stair carpets were up, in the town they would have come to,” he said. and so were the bedroom carpets. The boards And when he found that nearly everything was bewere marked by dirty feet, for the elegant and su- | ing knocked down either to them or to other perior household furniture and effects had been on strangers whom no one knew, he began to think the view all day. Townsfolk who had never crossed fame of his good taste must have spread very widely. the threshold before had been through every room In fact the townfolks got hardly anything. It in the house save one. Brokers from Shiretown had soon became apparent that the strangers meant to sounded all the chairs and tables and bedsteads. have it all their own way, and when once or twice a Everything was ticketed and numbered for the sale townsman, having set his mind on some particular on the morrow. Lot 342 was the gilded cage with article, was allowed to get it only after it had been Alla's love-birds, and Lot 370 was “ Nelly." Lot run up to about double its value, townspeople be420 was her harp, and Lot 421 her piano. These came very shy of bidding, and had it not been that things I marked for my own. Lots 500 to 574 in- there were two or three sets of these foreign broclusive were my uncle's books, done up in bundles kers, the front-seat couple would have had all at of about balf a dozen, irrespective of subject. I their own price. Indeed, as it was, the prices of looked through these, and noted a few parcels which the early part of the sale were not maintained. contained his favorite authors. I noted the num- For the strangers played into each other's hands bers of some few choice pieces of furniture, and then after a while, and spared each other's purses. we returned to the little room where my uncle sat! It was some little surprise to me that none of looking into the fire. He and Ada had sat there them bid against me for the few lots I had marked, all day, keeping the door locked, while the tramp and that they all fell to me at less than half their of footsteps went on outside.

value. We did not sit long, however, before my uncle! Hopkins, the butler, who had lived with my unwent off in low spirits enough to his bed. But Ada cle forty years (having come as stable boy), made and I sat later, side by side (on a favorite little two or three bids at one lot and got it, that lot becouch), and there we had a conversation we are ing the brass door-plate, with my uncle's name on it. not likely soon to forget. Indeed, we sat and talked | He did not bid at anything else, but wrapped this so long that it was morning before I went off to my up carefully, with its screws, and went off with it. resting-place, which she told me I should find in. *** You 'll never make money of that bargain, Lot 127.

Hopkins," said my uncle ; but no one else joked the And I wish I may never have a worse lot than I old man upon his purchase. found it. It was a good bed, in which I had slept It was a two days' sale; and when all was over, many a time before, and I jotted it down as one of it was actually found that nine tenths of the goods the things I must try to buy, along with the little which had been sold had become the property of couch. But a man does not find sleep in the down- some half dozen strangers, and that these half dozen iest pillow, unless he takes it with him, and I did had all been acting in concert, the real purchasers not sleep that night.

of the whole being James and Patchett, the eminent Indeed, at breakfast-time, we none of us looked brokers in Oxford Street. much refreshed. And when the townsfolk began They said they would send orders from London to come in again for their final view, it cost us some in a day or two for the disposal of their purchases, little effort to rouse ourselves into decent spirits. which, in the mean time, they would be glad if they Ada went off to a neighbor's to be out of the sound could leave. “ Perhaps my uncle would be willof the auctioneer's hammer. My uncle, however, ing to still consider them at his service until they put on a cheerful, brave face, stayed at home, and sent for them." went, stick in hand, from room to room, and told My uncle thanked them, but could not accept the real value of this piece of furniture and that to such a loan from strangers. He was going, he said, friends who wished to purchase, and won good-will that night to the hotel, and next day with me to and sympathy in his misfortune, as he had won re- London. spect and esteem in his prosperity.

“ Take the key, Hopkins,” he said, “ and leave it Amongst others came in old Miss Bellamy. My at the Bank.” And Hopkins took it and locked the uncle saw her coming up the stairs, and drew me door. back into a bedroom till she passed, and so kept “ Why, what extravagance is this, Hopkins ? " out of her sight till she had gone from room to room, he exclaimed again, as he saw the cab from the Sun slowly, through all the house, and left it again. waiting for hiin at the door. “Do you think all

After her came, in a little while, two respectable- this has taken the use of my limbs from me, and looking men, strangers to the town, - brokers, it that I could not walk a couple of hundred yards ?”. was whispered, from London, -- and these having “I am not going to have a lot of people staring also gone the round of the house, note-book in hand, at you as you walk," said Hopkins. chose for themselves seats in front, near the auc | So we got in, - Hopkins outside with the driver. tioneer's desk, and, the hour of sale being close at| “Why, he's taking us round by Jackson's Lane," hand, made it very clear that they had come with said my uncle, as he pulled down the window, and decided intentions of doing business.

called to the driver to know where he was going Strange, how elastic is the spirit under trouble. “It's all right," said Hopkins ; "I've a call to As the sale went on, and my uncle saw first one make, if you'll excuse me taking the liberty." favorite piece of furniture and then another fall' “ Confound his impudence," said my uncle, “drivunder the hammer, his spirits rose, and he became ing me about to make his calls !" very cheerful and lively. He chuckled and rubbed. Now, Jackson's Lane is just outside the town, and his hands when things went for more than he had has a few pretty little semi-detached houses in it, given for them, although it put no penny in his each with a neat bit of a garden in front.