Long House

“ In the first place, the houses are all built on posts, some of them twenty feet in height, and the mode of access to them is by climbing up a notched pole, which answers the purpose of a ladder. The chief dwelling in every village, and indeed practically the village itself, is the long house, which is of wonderfully large dimensions. ”

“ They called their five-fold league The Long House, from the style of dwelling which was common among them,—a long house in which as many as twenty families sometimes lived. The Iroquois built villages, cultivated plots of land, and sometimes planted apple orchards. ”

“ Came in their holiday dresses the blithe Acadian peasants.
Many a glad good-morrow and jocund laugh from the young folk
Made the bright air brighter, as up from the numerous meadows,
Where no path could be seen but the track of wheels in the greensward,
Group after group appeared, and joined, or passed on the highway.
Long ere noon, in the village all sounds of labor were silenced.
Thronged were the streets with people; and noisy groups at the house-doors
Sat in the cheerful sun, and rejoiced and gossipped together.
Every house was an inn, where all were welcomed and feasted ”

“ Perhaps no one thing contributes more to a sense of dignity than long residence in one house, and it was natural enough that the Terrace should shrug its shoulders at the row of toy dwellings that sprang up almost magically on Pleasant Street. ”

“ So before the next winter's snows we were snug in the house that has been ours ever since, with a ridge of wooded hills, the "backbone of Long Island," between New York and us. The very lights of the city were shut out. So was the slum, and I could sleep.
[Illustration: My Little Ones gathering Daisies for 'the Poors']
Fifteen summers have passed since. The house lies yonder, white and peaceful under the trees. Long since, the last dollar of the mortgage was paid and our home freed from debt. ”

“ Either course will bring you before a wide low house of yellow brick, with green blinds and white woodwork and English ivy. Directly ahead of you, across the circle of the driveway, the square main section of the house, capped by a tower, rises above a bright portico. To left and right the house throws out long extensions of even height, terminating in wings set endwise to you, like double-faces in the game of dominoes. Your first impression will be one of unusual size, your next of flatly rectangular simplicity. ”

“ But you see I've lived right here in this old house pretty near all my life, and takin' me up and carryin' me to off to Lexin'ton was jest about like takin' up that old ellum-tree out yonder and carryin' it over and settin' it out in another county. You've got to be mighty keerful how you move old folks around. ”

“ The house was left; the house was deserted. It was left like a shell on a sandhill to fill with dry salt grains now that life had left it. The long night seemed to have set in; the trifling airs, nibbling, the clammy breaths, fumbling, seemed to have triumphed. ”

“ For a long while dwellers in cities have been accustomed to live one above another, and as your aunt won’t hear of a small house in the suburbs I am quite willing to put up with a third or fourth-story flat, and that is precisely why I cannot but regret giving up the idea of an old house. ”

“ And it was dreary enough in all conscience, for there is nothing more desolate in all the abodes of men than an unfurnished house dimly lit, silent, and forsaken, and yet tenanted by rumour with the memories of evil and violent histories.
They were standing in a wide hall-way; on their left was the open door of a spacious dining-room, and in front the hall ran, ever narrowing, into a long, dark passage that led apparently to the top of the kitchen stairs. ”

“ The Long Man is a rude figure cut in the turf by the monks of the Benedictine priory that once flourished here, the ruins of which are now incorporated (like Alciston Grange) in a farm house on the east of the village. ”

“ You saunter on past the Corn-mill and cottages around it, and down a short declivity to Hause Bank. An intelligent villager, who has resided at Hause Bank during the whole of a long life, tells me that the ancient cottage adjoining the smith’s shop was formerly an ale-house, and that a neighbour, who died at a great age, when my informant was a boy, used to relate that he remembered having seen two brothers of the Fleming family who were staying at the Hall, go in there for ale, and make a scramble with their change amongst the children round the door, of whom the relater was one. ”

“ He has left the old floors, for flooring such as men laid in those days was not to be disciplined for little irregularities. Between the drawing room and the study hangs the original front door, with a lock three hands broad, and the great key that turned on the invader’s last good-bye. Even electricity came into the house in a quiet disguise. If it is candle-light, and you should peer into the low-studded dining-room, with its musket and pewter, and its great fireplace, you will be forgiven if your fancy pictures a Continental cavalryman bolting his supper at the end of the long table. ”

“ They lived, as you probably recall, in a quaint old-fashioned home near Hubbard Woods—just the two of them; no children. Following the tragedy, the house was closed up and for a long while remained unoccupied. Despite the scarcity of dwelling places, nobody apparently cared to live there. ”

“ Long was that house, and at one end anigh the gable was the Man's-door, not so high that a man might stand on the threshold and his helmcrest clear the lintel; for such was the custom, that a tall man must bow himself as he came into the hall ”

“ When Forrest went through the French windows from his sleeping-porch, he crossed, first, a comfortable dressing room, window-divaned, many-lockered, with a generous fireplace, out of which opened a bathroom; and, second, a long office room, wherein was all the paraphernalia of business—­desks, dictaphones, filing cabinets, book cases, magazine files, and drawer-pigeonholes that tiered to the low, beamed ceiling. ”

“ Burton made an early call the next day at the house on Rowan Street. Leslie Underwood was in the garden when he came up, and he stopped for a moment at the gate to enjoy the picture she made. It would be impossible for any one with sensibilities not to enjoy a painted picture of a beautiful girl bending before a bed of pansies, her summer gown of blue lawn making an effective contrast to the green grass upon which its folds rippled, and her hair bare to the sun. ”

“ But you did not go so far if you wanted to find where the Little Brother to the Bear lived.
As you followed the wood road you came suddenly to a little clearing, with a brook and a wild meadow and a ledge all covered with ferns. The road twisted about here, as a road always does in going by a pretty place, as if it were turning back for another look. There was a little old house under the ledge wherein some shy, silent children lived; and this was the only dwelling of man on the three-mile road. ”

“ Sometimes two or three families unite to build a single large house, but always in such cases each family has its separate apartment. When a house is dug open it is evident from the different impressions that each member of the family has his own bed, which he always occupies. ”

“ They fabled—or said, for it might not have been a false story—that every descendant of this house had a certain portion of his life, during which he sought the track of that footstep which was left on the threshold of the mansion; that he sought it far and wide, over every foot of the estate; not only on the estate, but throughout the neighborhood; not only in the neighborhood but all over England; not only throughout England but all about the world. It was the belief of the neighborhood—at least of some old men and women in it—that the long period of Mr. ”

“ The figure of a man moving with a sort of stealthy swiftness among the shadows of the garden caught his eye, and instantly he was alert. The man crossed an open patch of moonlight and, with a curious feeling that it was what he had expected, Burton recognized Henry Underwood. He came directly toward the side of the house where the surgery was, and a moment later Burton heard the outer door of the back hall open, and footsteps went past his closed door. ”

“ They ain’t sure that you’ll stay here long. Maybe them other relatives will come on, or begin suit in the courts, or something. And the neighbors don’t like to mix in, or take sides, until the matter’s straightened out.”
“Oh, dear, me!” sighed Ruth. “We love staying here at the old Corner House, but we never wished to take anybody’s rights away from them. Mr. Howbridge assured us that we were the only heirs, and that the estate would in time be settled upon us. It makes me feel very badly—this news you tell me, Miss Titus.”
“Well! let sleepin’ dogs lie, is my motter,” declared the seamstress. ”

“ A house may be large or small; as long as the neighboring houses are likewise small, it satisfies all social requirements for a residence. But let there arise next to the little house a palace, and the little house shrinks into a hut. The little house now makes it clear that its inmate has no social position at all to maintain, or but a very insignificant one; ”

“ We, my mother, Lovell, Fanny, and I, came here yesterday, glad to see Lord Longford surrounded by his friends in old Pakenham Hall hospitable style,—he always cordial, unaffected, and agreeable. The house has been completely new-modelled, chimneys taken down from top to bottom, rooms turned about from lengthways to broad-ways, thrown into one another, and out of one another, and the result is that there is a comfortable excellent drawing-room, dining-room, and library, and the bedchambers are admirable. ”

“ It was dawn now on Long Island and we went about opening the rest of the windows downstairs, filling the house with gray-turning, gold-turning light. The shadow of a tree fell abruptly across the dew and ghostly birds began to sing among the blue leaves. There was a slow, pleasant movement in the air, scarcely a wind, promising a cool, lovely day. ”

“ I do not mind if my cottage is rather small
So long as there's room enough for bed and mat.
Often and often the neighbours come to see me
And with brave words discuss the things of old.
Rare writings we read together and praise:
Doubtful meanings we examine together and settle. ”

“ The aspect of the venerable mansion has always affected me like a human countenance, bearing the traces not merely of outward storm and sunshine, but expressive also, of the long lapse of mortal life, and accompanying vicissitudes that have passed within. Were these to be worthily recounted, they would form a narrative of no small interest and instruction, and possessing, moreover, a certain remarkable unity, which might almost seem the result of artistic arrangement. ”

“ Eliza, our old servant, is slow because she has rheumatism. She's getting old,--but that isn't a crime, is it? I'll be getting old some time myself, I suppose. But I've got all my faculties yet, thank Heaven."
"Have you lived in this house long?" Lyon asked.
"I built this house twenty-five years ago for my son,--Edith's father, you know. There have been many changes, many changes. He died when he was thirty, and his young wife followed him and left the baby Edith and me alone together. There's something wrong when young people die and old people are left. ”

“ Lyon noticed that though they nodded to each other they did not speak. At the top Fullerton pushed ahead so as to come first through the revolving pepperbox of a storm-door which made the entrance of fresh air to the Court House as difficult as was the exit of foul air within. Lawrence swung through in the next compartment, pushing the door around much more rapidly than suited Fullerton's dignified gait. ”

“ They look as ancient as the houses and so alike that I could not believe there were three of them if, every time I go to my dining-room window, I did not see them all three in their chambers, two on the third floor, to the left and right of me, one on the floor below about halfway between,—making, J. says, an amusing kind of pattern. Each lives alone, each has a little table drawn up to his window, and there they sit all day long, one on an easy leather chair, one on a stiff cane-bottomed chair, one on a hard wooden stool,—that is the only difference. ”

“ Burton shrugged his shoulders, put his hat back at the customary angle, and set off for Watson's.
He had not wished to arrive at Watson's too early, but now he suddenly had a panic fear that he might be too late. He hurried on, trying to guess his way through an unfamiliar part of the town, and wondering what Henry had done with the watchman who was supposed to keep him in sight. Had he drugged him or tied him up as Hadley had been tied, or merely and effectively killed him? Nothing less would excuse the man's failure to keep the watch set. ”

“ John—we bought happiness with it! And they are all dead, now, back there at Saint Michael’s. And there is not a thing to regret—not one. 28Oh, thank God—thank God! If we had saved that money, there would be something to regret. We would have to remember that one was denied this—the other—that. But we’ll have the roof yet.”
John sniffled and let his arm go gently around her.
“Betsy—forgive me. I didn’t mean—”
“Why, John, dear,” said Betsy, smiling again, “in a little while we will not need a house. John! ‘In my Father’s house are many mansions’!” ”

“ Town, City.—Repeat the sign for "house" a number of times, moving the hands here and there or from side to side.
Things.—Placing the right "&" hand over toward the left, palm up, draw it toward the right, dropping the hand continuously.
Bone (or anything hard like porcelain, etc) .—Strike the front teeth with the end of the forefinger of the right hand.
Dish.—Sign for "bone," then with the ends of the hands together draw them toward self in a curve, bringing the heels together and thus indicating the round shape of a dish. ”