protection: and should appear to owe to its weakness, rather than to its
strength, that it is neither overwhelmed by the one, nor crushed by the
other.

51. Such are the chief attributes, without which a mountain cottage
cannot be said to be beautiful. It may possess others, which are
desirable or objectionable, according to their situation, or other
accidental circumstances. The nature of these will be best understood by
examining an individual building. The material is, of course, what is
most easily attainable and available without much labor. The Cumberland
and Westmoreland hills are, in general, composed of clay-slate and
gray-wacke, with occasional masses of chert[7] (like that which forms
the summit of Scawfell), porphyritic greenstone, and syenite. The chert
decomposes deeply, and assumes a rough brown granular surface, deeply
worn and furrowed. The clay-slate or gray-wacke, as it is shattered by
frost, and carried down by torrents, of course forms itself into
irregular flattish masses. The splintery edges of these are in some
degree worn off by the action of water; and, slight decomposition taking
place on the surface of the clay-slate, furnishes an aluminous soil,
which is immediately taken advantage of by innumerable lichens, which
change the dark gray of the original substance into an infinite variety
of pale and warm colors. These stones, thus shaped to his hand, are the
most convenient building materials the peasant can obtain.[8] He lays
his foundation and strengthens his angles with large masses, filling up
the intervals with pieces of a more moderate size; and using here and
there a little cement to bind the whole together, and to keep the wind
from getting through the interstices; but never enough to fill them
altogether up, or to render the face of the wall smooth. At intervals of
from 4 ft. to 6 ft. a horizontal line of flat and broad fragments is
introduced projecting about a foot from the wall. Whether this is