her they
were sure all the rest would follow. Instead of this, their whole
talk was about the business, or the pleasure, or the fashion of the
strange but bewitching country which they were merely passing
through, in which they had not one foot of land which they were sure
of calling their own for the next quarter of an hour. What little
estate they had was _personal_, and not real, and that was a
mortgaged, life-hold tenement of clay, not properly their own, but
only lent to them on a short, uncertain lease, of which three-score
years and ten was considered as the longest period, and very few
indeed lived in it to the end of the term; for this was always at
the _will of the lord_, part of whose prerogative it was, that he
could take away the lease at pleasure, knock down the stoutest
tenement at a single blow, and turn out the poor shivering, helpless
inhabitant naked, to that _far country_ for which he had made no
provision. Sometimes, in order to quicken the pilgrim in his
preparation, the lord would break down the tenement by slow degrees;
sometimes he would let it tumble by its own natural decay; for as it
was only built to last a certain term, it would often grow so
uncomfortable by increasing dilapidations even before the ordinary
lease was out, that the lodging was hardly worth keeping, though the
tenant could seldom be persuaded to think so, but finally clung to
it to the last. First the thatch on the top of the tenement changed
color, then it fell off and left the roof bare; then the grinders
ceased because they were few; then the windows became so darkened
that the owner could scarcely see through them; then one prop fell
away, then another, then the uprights became bent, and the whole
fabric trembled and tottered, with every other symptom of a falling
house. But what was remarkable, the more uncomfortable the house
became, and the less prospect there was of staying in it, the more
preposterously fond did the tenant grew of his precarious
habitation.

On some occasions the lord ordered his messengers, of which he had a
great variety, to batter, injure, deface, and almost demolish the
frail building, even while it seemed new and strong; this was what
the landlord called _giving warning_, but many a tenant would not
take warning, and so fond of staying where he was, even under all
these inconveniences, that at last he was cast out by ejectment, not
being prevailed on to leave the dwelling in a proper manner,