To abate the nuisance, however, I broke open the door and entered the long-abandoned room. Since the four-pounder had occupied it, for some years that room must have been employed as a place for lumber, because it proved to contain a quantity of old, disused articles in iron and tin, and amongst these were two stands for rushlights, a tinder-box, and a glass phosphorus bottle. Such a find carried one back, as few other things could, to early days, and showed one the enormous advance we have made in this century in the comforts of life. Some of us can remember the rushlight, a few the phosphorus bottle, fewer the tinder-box. Of the rushlights I found, one was familiar to me; the other, probably an earlier type, I had never seen. The former consisted of a cylinder of sheet-iron, perforated with round holes, the cylinder about two feet high. This contained the rushlight. At the bottom was a basin for a little water, that the sparks, as they fell, might be extinguished. Well do I recall such rushlight lamps! One always burned at night in my father’s bedroom, and when I was ill I was accommodated with one as well. The feeble, flickering light issued through the perforations and capered in fantastic forms over the walls and furniture. The other rushlight lamp was of a different construction. It consisted of a long spiral of iron wire, and was probably discarded for the newer and safer invention of the lamp with perforated holes. The spiral coil would prevent the lanky rushlight from falling over and out of the lamp, but not the red-hot dock from spluttering on to the carpet or boards of the floor. [Illustration: _Fig. 27._--RUSHLIGHT-HOLDERS.] There was in use, formerly, in England another sort of rushlight-holder. It consisted of an iron rod planted in a socket of wood that stood on the floor. To this rod, which was round, was affixed a sliding contrivance that upheld a socket for the rushlight, which might be raised or lowered as suited convenience. Connected with the holder was the snuffer. The candle had to be taken _out_ of its socket to have its wick pinched between the upright unremovable snuffers. Conceive the inconvenience! The drip of tallow about fingers and floor! We have indeed advanced since such candle-holders were in use. They stood about four feet from the floor.