interesting to deserve description.

While we are on the subject of the Thornes, one word must be said of
the house they lived in. It was not a large house, nor a fine house,
nor perhaps to modern ideas a very commodious house, but by those
who love the peculiar colour and peculiar ornaments of genuine Tudor
architecture it was considered a perfect gem. We beg to own ourselves
among the number, and therefore take this opportunity to express our
surprise that so little is known by English men and women of the
beauties of English architecture. The ruins of the Colosseum, the
Campanile at Florence, St. Mark's, Cologne, the Bourse and Notre Dame
are with our tourists as familiar as household words; but they know
nothing of the glories of Wiltshire, Dorsetshire, and Somersetshire.
Nay, we much question whether many noted travellers, men who have
pitched their tents perhaps under Mount Sinai, are not still ignorant
that there are glories in Wiltshire, Dorsetshire, and Somersetshire.
We beg that they will go and see.

Mr. Thorne's house was called Ullathorne Court--and was properly so
called, for the house itself formed two sides of a quadrangle, which
was completed on the other two sides by a wall about twenty feet
high. This wall was built of cut stone, rudely cut indeed, and now
much worn, but of a beautiful, rich, tawny yellow colour, the effect
of that stonecrop of minute growth which it had taken three centuries
to produce. The top of this wall was ornamented by huge, round stone
balls of the same colour as the wall itself. Entrance into the court
was had through a pair of iron gates so massive that no one could
comfortably open or close them--consequently, they were rarely
disturbed. From the gateway two paths led obliquely across the
court: that to the left reaching the hall-door, which was in the
corner made by the angle of the house, and that to the right leading
to the back entrance, which was at the further end of the longer
portion of the building.

With those who are now adepts in contriving house accommodation, it
will militate much against Ullathorne Court that no carriage could be
brought to the hall-door. If you enter Ullathorne at all, you must
do so, fair reader, on foot, or at least in a bath-chair. No vehicle
drawn by horses ever comes within that iron gate. But this is
nothing to the next horror that will encounter you. On entering the
front door, which you do by no very grand portal, you find yourse