They valued and prized the
house that they had reared, or added to, or improved. Hence they loved
to carve their names or their initials on the lintels of their doors
or on the walls of their houses with the date. On the stone houses of
the Cotswolds, in Derbyshire, Lancashire, Cumberland, wherever good
building stone abounds, you can see these inscriptions, initials
usually those of husband and wife, which preserved the memorial of
their names as long as the house remained in the family. Alas! too
often the memorial conveys no meaning, and no one knows the names they
represent. But it was a worthy feeling that prompted this building for
futurity. There is a mystery about the inscription recorded in the
illustration "T.D. 1678." It was discovered, together with a sword
(_temp._ Charles II), between the ceiling and the floor when an old
farm-house called Gundry's, at Stoke-under-Ham, was pulled down. The
year was one of great political disturbance, being that in which the
so-called "Popish Plot" was exploited by Titus Oates. Possibly
"T.D." was fearful of being implicated, concealed this inscription,
and effected his escape.
[Illustration: Staircase Newel Cromwell House, Highgate]
Our forefathers must have been animated by the spirit which caused Mr.
Ruskin to write: "When we build, let us think that we build for ever.
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