The nice old cracks that used to look, not like wrinkles but like smiles, have all been closed up. A wing has been added for the convenience of the domestic economy; and as the tiles were falling off the roof they have been replaced by slates. I have no quarrel with slates. There are some of an almost lilac grey, like the throat of a turtle-dove, that are very prisms for reflecting the light. But slate roofs are flat and monotonous, uniform and without character, while tiles, rounded, irregular, humped, seem actually to stir, to move, to stretch themselves like the good old turtles in the garden, that sigh for fair weather, and hump their backs in protest against wind and rain. The colour of tiles shades from red to black, passing gradually or abruptly through all the diminishing tones between. And those who have eyes to see can guess at the age of the house entirely from the degree of their incrustation. However, its age is accurately set down on the blackened tablet in the great chimney which is the glory of the kitchen. As soon as I rightly knew my letters and figures, father had set me to read the date, and I quite understood that he took pride in it, whereas grandfather sneered at the little ceremony, murmuring in the background, below his voice by way of not attracting too much attention, but quite distinctly enough for me to hear, “Do leave the child in peace!” Was it 1610 or 1670? No one could be quite certain, short of calling together all our local academies. The stroke at the left of the upright was too horizontal for a 1 and not sufficiently so for a 7. “It’s not of the slightest importance,” said grandfather, to whom I referred the matter.