Edward Knight's Family
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Elizabeth Austen, later Knight, continued.
'... a glory in the Spring and the nightingales filled the Summer nights with melody.
Splendid old trees, elm, oak, beech and lime, surrounded the house and threw their long shadows across the rich, deep meadows in the golden sunset, and sheltered from the mid-day heat the herd of Jersey cows and the many little South Down sheep which passed their lives in peace and plenty.
An old house, full of lovely old Chippendale furniture, beautifull pictures and old china, all of them so entirely a necessary part of the house that they went for the most part almost un-noticed.
There was a 'breakfast room' and a 'Cedar' recess, a Powdering-closet and a wide shallow staircase with twisted balusters of black oak, little flights of stairs in every direction, leading to long, narrow passages and wide landings and sweet old-fashioned bedrooms with four-poster beds, blazing fires in old hob grates where copper kettles sang. Quaint old prints on the walls, wide sofas and welcoming armchairs covered with tiny-patterned chintzes.
Downstairs, the Drawing Room (Parlour it was called not so long ago) had small-paned high windows with deep low window seats, the windows always thrown wide open in Summer – and protected from the sun by striped red and white awnings. Through them floated the perfume of heliotrope and roses, scented geranium and ...'
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