The house in which the Hubbards lived was a grey, wooden cottage, of the smallest size; curious gossips had, indeed, often wondered how it had ever been made to contain a large family; but some houses, like certain purses, possess capabilities of expansion, quite independent of their apparent size, and connected by mysterious sympathies with the heads and hearts of their owners. This cottage belonged to the most ancient and primitive style of American architecture; what may be called the comfortable, common sense order--far superior, one might suppose to either Corinthian or Composite, for a farm-house. The roof was low, and unequally divided, stretching, on one side, with a long, curving slope, over the southern front; which was scarce seven feet high: towards the road the building was a little more elevated, for a dormer-window gave it the dignity of a story and a half. Not only the roof, but the walls--we have classical authority for wooden walls--were covered with rounded shingles, long since grey, and in spots, moss-grown. Twice the cottage had escaped a more brilliant exterior; upon one occasion it had been inhabited by an ambitious family, who talked of a coat of red paint; fortunately, they moved away, before concluding a bargain with the painter. Again, when the Hubbards took possession of the 'old grey house,' a committee of ladies actually drove over from Longbridge, with the intention of having it whitewashed; but, the experienced old negro engaged to clean generally, gave it as his opinion, that the shingles were not worth the compliment. The windows were very small; more than half the glass was of the old, blue bull's-eye pattern, no longer to be found at modern glaziers, and each heavy window-shutter had a half-moon cut in its upper panel, to let in the daylight. When we add, that there was a low porch before the door, with a sweet-briar on one side, and a snowball on the other, the reader will have a correct idea of the house inhabited by our friends, the Hubbards. {"Corinthian or Composite" = two of the classical orders of architecture, based on the style of column used. The "Composite order," however, was something of a Cooper family joke, first used by James Fenimore Cooper in "The Pioneers" (1823) to describe a pretentious building of no particular style at all. The Coopers, father and daughter, were contemptuous of buildings that pretended to be Greek temples} The cottage stood within a little door-yard, near the gate which opened on the lawn of Wyllys-Roof; and, immediately opposite the place recently purchased by Mr. Taylor. Here the family had lived for the last twelve years; and, from that time, Miss Patsey had been obliged to struggle against poverty, with a large family of younger brothers and sisters, dependent, in a great measure, upon her prudence and exertions.