ssia," says Milburd, superciliously.
Professing to have travelled considerably himself, he doesn't like the
idea of anyone having done the same.

"I wish," exclaims Cazell, using a formula of his own, "I wish I had as
many sovereigns as I've been in Central Russia."

This appears conclusive, and, if it isn't, here we are at the House.
Blackmeer Hall. Elizabethan, apparently.

[Illustration: AN OLD WOMAN RECEIVES US AT THE DOOR.]

CHAPTER III.

WITHIN--THE HOUSEKEEPER--WINDOWS--INFORMATION--THE ORIEL--VIEW--
FLOOR--MILBURD'S INQUIRY--TYPICAL DEVELOPMENT--MATERIAL--AN EXAMPLE
--CRONE--POOR--MEDITATIONS--THE FRESCO--TAPESTRY--ARMOUR--MICE--RATS
--THE GHOST.

An old woman curtseys, and ushers our party into the Hall itself, which
is lofty and spacious, but in a mildewy condition.

The floor is partly stone partly tiles, as if the original designer had
been, in his day, uncertain whether to make a roof of it, or not.

A fine old chimney, with a hearth for logs, and dogs, is at one end, and
reminds me of retainers, deer hounds, oxen roasted whole, and Christmas
revels in the olden time.

The windows are diamond-paned. To open in compartments.

The old woman tells us that this was rebuilt in fifteen hundred and
fifty-two, and then she shows us into the drawing-room.

This is a fine apartment with an Oriel window, giving on to a lawn of
rank and tangled grass. Beyond this chaos of green, is a well timbered
covert, dense as a small black forest.

The distance between the trees becoming greater to the left of the
plantation, we obtain a glimpse of the lake which we passed on our road.

There is another grand fire-place in this room. The wainscot wants
patching up, and so does the parqueted floor.

The old woman tells us that "they say as Queen Elizabeth was once here."

Milburd asks seriously, "Do you recollect her, ma'am?"

The crone wags her head and replies "that it was afore her time."

Mentioning the word Crone to Boodels, I ask him what relation it bears
to 'Cronie.' "'Cronie,' almost obsolete now, means 'a familiar friend,'"
I explain to him. He says thank you, and supposes that the two words
have nothing in common except sound.

The notion being in fact part of my scheme for _Typical Developments_
(Vol. XIII. Part I. "_On sounds of words and their relation to one
another_"), I offer him my idea on the subject.

He asks, "What is it?"

_Happy Thought._--"Crone" is th