Crisis and Country Cottages The September crisis had another effect
on country life which still persists ; it has been responsible for something like a racket in the business of country cottages. Throughout the autumn friends one had not seen for a long time turned up anxiously and expected cottages to be produced out of hats. Other and more considerate friends left it on the " if- you-see-anything-let-us-know " basis. The results were in- teresting. The price for what had been a labourer's cottage from which the last labourer had prayed heaven to remove him was in the neighbourhood of £1,700. Converted and charm- ing though it was, the price was fantastic. A derelict farm- house which was nothing better than the wire frame on which, ultimately, expensive materials can be moulded into a hat, was offered at round about £I,000. A cottage, so-called Eliza- bethan, with a " sunk garden "—a hole in the ground deco- rated with lumps of slag—was offered at k600.
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