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Show HOW OUR ANCESTORS LIVED Tho So-Called Good Old Days Had No Advantages Over Present Time. For centuries the common people-of England made their home In -wooden huts of one room. When x family increased in-creased is numbers or wealth, another an-other hut was built beside it, or, rathr eer, a lean-to was added, and then another an-other and another, as need required. Sometimes they followed a straight, line; at other times they were built out from the central hut at various angles. The roofs of these huts were thatcted. An opening was left in the center for the smoke to escape. The, fire was alvay6 built in a hollow in the center of the room. Beds were, made of straw, often they were merely mere-ly shakedowns in the corner. Occasionally Occa-sionally the straw was hed in a little, frame resembling the ribs of a ship. Houses built by Saxon knights were much more pretentious. They were big halls, like the Roman atrium, with a lofty roof thatched with slate or wood shingles. The floor was of hard clay. In the middle was a great fire, of dry wood. The thin, acrid smoke from the fire escaped through an opening open-ing in the roof directly above the, hearth. Round the fire were long benches on I which hearthsmen and visitors sat when not fighting or at work, and; j talked and drank the hours through. The tables were long boards on trestles. At night the floor was strewn, with straw, and, like the less prosperous prosper-ous folk, host and visitors slept to- I gether. Youth'B Companion. |